Effects of Waste Glass Powder Filler on Intumescent Coating for Steel Structures Application

Abstract

Intumescent coating is a passive fire protection system used to prevent and resist the spreading of fire. The coating swells several times of its thickness on exposure to the fire, forming cellular foam and acts as an insulative barrier, thus delaying the heat transfer to the protected substrate. The study aims to analyse waste glass powder filler’s effect into intumescent coating formulation limited to one size of waste glass powder. Waste glass is a broken form of leftover by-product from industrial and domestic. Millions of tons of waste glass generated every year, adding with their non-biodegradable nature causing additional environmental pollution. Waste glass powder contains high silica composition known for its high thermal stability, weather resistance, hydrophobicity, low surface tension, and high oxidation resistance. The coating showed improved thermal stability, weather resistance, and adhesion when added into intumescent coating formulation. The lowest recorded backside substrate temperature 154.6 °C compare to coating without the waste glass filler, 333.7 C. The coating also showed less than 0.1% total weight loss for samples with 4% wt. filler after immersion in seawater for 15 days compared to the control formulation, 0.19%. The char morphology analysis showed the emergence of silica and calcium elements occupying the expandable char’s gaps, thus strengthening the char structure.