Thermal degradation and fire properties of epoxy modified resins

The flammability of the resin is a major limitation in the aeronautic applications where new developed materials for primary and secondary structures must fulfill special regulation in order to demonstrate that their level of fire safety is equivalent to a conventional transport (aluminum) material. In this paper, the attention is focused on the thermal properties and the fire behavior of TGMDA based epoxy resins in which carbon nanotubes and POSS have been dispersed at nanometric or molecular level. The effect of the hardener, the diluent and the nanoparticles on the thermal properties has been investigated. Thermogravimetric data have been modeled according to the Coats and Redfen equations which provide a fast method for the determination of the kinetics of thermal degradation of polymers. The char yield has been used as criteria for evaluating limiting oxygen index (LOI) of the resin in accordance with Van Krevelen and Hoftyzer equation and the results have been compared with the experimental LOI data