Evaluation of thermal degradation behavior and fire resistance performance of wood-plastic composites containing different modified clay nanoparticles

In this present work, the influence of different clays on the thermal and combustion properties of reed flour (RF) reinforced polyvinyl chloride (PVC) composites were investigated. Firstly, two types of nanoclay, namely layered double hydroxide (LDH) and halloysite nanotube (HNT) were modified with a surfactant before usage. Thereafter, the weight loss, melting temperature, and fire characteristics were evaluated by thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), and cone calorimeter tests. The result revealed the addition of both mLDH and mHNT clays can distinctly enhance the thermal stability of the composites by increasing the decomposition temperature and char residues. The samples including mHNT (32.23%) showed higher residual weight values compared to those of the samples with mLDH (29.82%). DSC data indicated that both the crystallization temperature and melting temperature of the specimens tended to substantially increase in presence of nanoclay. The findings showed that the heat release rate and mass loss rate of the specimens treated with mHNT are respectively reduced by 2.1%, and 7.8% compared to that of mLDH. Both time to ignition and limiting oxygen index values increased approximately 9% as the 5 phc mHNT was incorporated into the specimens as compared with mLDH ones.