TITLE:
Physical Characterization and Elaboration Discussion of a Clay-PEG 6000 Composite with Natural Clay Matrix
AUTHORS:
Iatimad Akhrif, Mostapha El Jai, Laila Mesrar, Ahmed Elkhalfi, Abdelhamid Touache, Raouf Jabrane
KEYWORDS:
Clay Structure, PEG 6000/Clay Matrix Composite, ICP Analysis, Atterberg Limits, Specific Surface, Shrinking, Microscopy Characterization
JOURNAL NAME:
Engineering,
Vol.6 No.7,
June
11,
2014
ABSTRACT: In this
paper, we compare different nanoclay-PEG composites and the influence of the
input parameters especially the percentage of PEG and the clay size. Because of
the facility of material elaboration, dried state with grinding, we adopted a
complete experiments plan to obtain a maximum of robustness of the responses. For
each sample, we made an XRD analysis to see if we obtain the intercalation of
the PEG 6000 (Polyethylene Glycol 6000) within the clay sheets. The
characterization adopted consists on the measurement of the shrinking of some
cylinders we made, the liquidity and plasticity limits according to the
Casagrande protocol used in geotechnical clays characterizations. We utilize
also the methylen blue protocol to estimate the variation of the specific
surface of ionic exchange of the clay sheets according to the PEG 6000
percentage and the clay sizes. SEM microscopy permits to visualize some of the
phases detected by the XRD analysis. The TEM microscopy permits also to see the
amorphous phases created by the grinding protocol which affects significantly
the specific surface and the shrinking of the new materials. For each section,
we made some conclusions with interpretation in order to integrate these
results in civil engineering, classical/artisanal material construction and
geotechnical fields.