Advancing tent thermoregulation: Integrating shape-stabilized PCM into fabric design

Abstract

Shape-stabilized phase change materials (ss-PCM) were prepared by impregnating capric acid (CA) and palmitic acid (PA) eutectic mixtures into the pores of Expanded Perlite (EP) using vacuum impregnation method. The ss-PCM was coated on fabric's surface using polyurethane (PU) solution, with different PCM/PU ratio. The microstructure, chemical stability, thermal properties and thermal reliability of ss-PCM were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT–IR), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA). Hydrophobicity performance was assessed by water contact angle (WCA). SEM images confirmed that CA–PA was successfully impregnated into the pores of EP. The results indicate that the latent heat of melting and freezing of the ss-PCM was 86.57 and 86.19 kJ/kg. The impregnated textile with the ss-PCM showed that the freezing enthalpies increased from 8.93 for Textile/PCM@5 up to 44.09 kJ/kg, for Textile/PCM@25 %. While Thermogravimetric analysis shows a good thermal stability of the composite textile/PCM. Mechanical properties revealed that the composite Textile/PCM@20 % present the higher tensile strength of 4.96 MPa compared to the other composite materials Furthermore, thermal cycling tests proved that the composite Textile/PCM@20 exhibits good long-term stability despite that both melting and freezing enthalpies were reduced by 7.4 and 14 %, respectively, after 100 cycles. These findings hold significant promise for applications in maintaining structures such as tents and buildings in thermal comfort range.