Preparation of Thermal Insulation Ceramics Using Felsic Tailings as Main Raw Material and Soda-ash Dregs as Flux

Abstract

Low-cost thermal insulation porous ceramics with uniform pore diameter and low bulk density were prepared with soda-ash dregs and felsic tailings. We investigated the effect of temperature, foaming agent, fluxing agent, Al₂O₃ and CaO content on the pore structure and crystal phase of porous ceramics. The effect of Ca²⁺ in soda-ash dregs on the preparation of quartz-feldspar based porous ceramics was studied. The results showed that the contribution of Ca²⁺ to the preparation of porous ceramics in this system was mainly to accelerate the Si-O bond fracture and reduce the sintering temperature at the initial stage of sintering, which destroyed the needle-like feldspar in the high temperature melt and reduced the melt viscosity, thus reduced the foaming resistance and promoted the porous products with uniform pore size distribution. The Ca²⁺ content on the high side can participate in the formation of crystals in sintering. The generated needle-like diopside and augite, which have small length-diameter ratio, will negligibly change in the viscosity of melt at high temperatures, and their inhibition effect on pores is not as good as that of feldspar with large length-diameter ratio, resulting in the merger and collapse of pores. But the increase of diopside and augite can improve the compressive strength of porous products to some extent. Porous ceramic products containing needle-like feldspar phase can be prepared by using two kinds of solid waste, which can improve the compressive strength of the products and reduce the raw material cost and energy consumption while comprehensively utilizing the double solid waste. The optimal product has a bulk density of 0.45 g/cm³, a compressive strength of 3.17 MPa, and a thermal conductivity of 0.11 W/(m·K).

Keywords

felsic tailings / Ca-riched Soda-ash dregs / low-cost thermal insulation porous ceramics / high content of solid waste / transformation of needle-like crystal phase

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