Fire performance, microstructure and thermal degradation of an epoxy based nano intumescent fire retardant coating for structural applications

Intumescent fire retardant coating (IFRC) is a passive fire protection system which swells upon heating to form expanded multi-cellular char layer that protects the substrate from fire. In this research work, IFRC's were developed using different flame retardants such as ammonium polyphosphate, expandable graphite, melamine and boric acid. These flame retardants were bound together with the help of epoxy binder and cured together using curing agent. IFRC was then reinforced with nano magnesium oxide and nano alumina as inorganic fillers to study their effect towards fire performance, microstructure and thermal degradation. Small scale fire test was conducted to investigate the thermal insulation of coating whereas fire performance was calculated using thermal margin value. Field emission scanning electron microscopy was used to examine the microstructure of char obtained after fire test. Thermogravimetric analysis was conducted to investigate the residual weight of coating. Results showed that the performance of the coating was enhanced by reinforcement with nano size fillers as compared to non-filler based coating. Comparing both nano size magnesium oxide and nano size alumina; nano size alumina gave better fire performance with improved microstructure of char and high residual weight. © 2015 AIP Publishing LLC.