Effect of Geopolymer filler in Glass Reinforced Epoxy (GRE) Pipe for Piping Application: Mechanical Properties

The present work is aimed to carry out the effect of geopolymer material which is fly ash as filler in the glass reinforced epoxy pipe on the microstructure of fly ash geopolymer, compression properties, and bulk density using the filament winding method. Conventional glass reinforced epoxy pipes has its own disadvantages such as high corrosion resistance at acidic environment and low strength which can be replaced by the composite pipes. Geopolymer is a type of amorphous alumino-silicate and can be synthesized by geopolymerization process. A series of glass reinforced epoxy pipe and glass reinforced epoxy pipe filled with 10 - 40 weight percentage geopolymer filler which is fly ash with 4 Molarity were prepared. Morphology of the raw material fly ash and fly ash based-geopolymer surface was characterized using scanning electron microscopy. It was found that the additions of fly ash at the beginning with 10 wt% are showing higher compressive strength than glass reinforced epoxy pipe without fly ash geopolymer filler. The compressive test of these series of samples was determined using Instron Universal Testing under compression mode. It was found that compressive strength for samples fly ash based-geopolymer filler are higher as compared to glass reinforced epoxy pipe without geopolymer filler. However, the compressive strength of glass reinforced epoxy pipe with fly ash geopolymer filler continues to decline when added to 20 wt% -40 wt% of geopolymer filler loading. The results showed that the mixing of geopolymer materials in epoxy system can be obtained in this study.