Speaker
Description
As new energy efficiency regulations tighten in the building sector, the required thickness for insulation with conventional materials (glass wool, polymeric foams...) may become prohibitive. This is a strong driving force for the development of a new class of products, the Super-Insulation at Atmospheric Pressure (SIAP) materials, based on the use of silica aerogel. Silica aerogels are characterized by a very high nanoporosity (~95%) responsible for their unprecedented low thermal conductivities but also for their very low mechanical properties. The materials studied here are composite panels produced using a bimodal distribution of silica aerogel grains, latex as binder and polypropylene fibers. The main objective in designing these composites is to improve their mechanical properties, mainly toughness, while preserving the silica aerogel thermal properties (thermal conductivity is approximately 15 mW/m/K). The composites and the aerogel particles used in their preparation were mechanically characterized: composites by using indentation, three point bending and Double Cleavage Drilled Compression (DCDC) tests and aerogel particles by uniaxial compression tests. Measurements of the thermal conductivity were carried out on composites using heat flux sensors. The data and mechanical properties collected experimentally were used to calibrate Discrete Element Method (DEM) simulations that successfully reproduce the fracture of aerogel particles. DEM simulations on composites were performed to determine potential optimisation paths for composite composition and preparation.
| Speaker Country | France |
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