A facile strategy for enhancing the fire safety of unsaturated polyester resins through introducing an efficient mono-component intumescent flame retardant

Unsaturated polyester resins (UPRs) are usually used in the field of automotive and electronic appliances, but their natural flammability severely constrain their wide application. In this research, a mono-component intumescent flame retardant piperazine pyrophosphate (PPAP) was incorporated into the UPR matrix and the fire retardancy, thermal properties, combustion performance, and flame-retarded mechanisms of UPR/PPAP were comprehensively investigated. With as low as 18 wt% PPAP introduced, UPR/18 wt% PPAP thermosets fulfilled UL-94 V-0 grade during vertical burning tests and the limiting oxygen index value reached 29.8%. Cone calorimeter tests shown that the peak of heat release and CO production were prominently declined with the decrease of 60.9% and 70.2% compared with those of UPR. The incorporation of PPAP efficaciously enhanced the fire safety of UPR thermosets. The investigation of flame-retarded mechanisms for UPR/PPAP thermosets indicated that PPAP stimulated UPR thermosets to form sufficient, compact, partially graphitized, and expanded char layer on thermosets surface in advance and the char layer effectively exerted shielding effect in condensed phase. Thus, the total amount of heat of UPR/PPAP was suppressed with the reduction of 42.5% compared with that of UPR. Overall, the excellent fire safety performance promised the flame-retardant UPR/PPAP thermosets crucial application values in some key areas.