Glass ceramic foams from coal ash and waste

glass: production and characterisation

J. P. Wu1, A. R. Boccaccini*1, P. D. Lee1, M. J. Kershaw1 and R. D. Rawlings1
Lightweight glass ceramic foams have been produced from a mixture of silicate wastes, namely
20 wt-% coal pond ash and 80 wt-% bottle glass cullet. A powder sintering route with the
incorporation of 2 wt-%SiC as foaming agent was used. The pore morphology achieved under
different sintering conditions was investigated in detail using X-ray microtomography. The
apparent density of the foams ranged from 0.2 to 0.4 g cm23, and the porosity ranged from 70 to
90%. Other variables, such as pore wall thickness, pore size and roundness, all behaved
consistently with sintering temperature. The optimum sintering temperature was found to be in the
range 1000–1050uC, at which porosity was about 75% and was the most uniform. Foams
produced under this condition exhibit satisfactory compressive strength of about 1.5 MPa and
show relatively high thermal shock resistance, with compressive strength gradually decreasing as
quenching temperature increases.
Keywords: Coal ash, Foaming agents, Glass ceramics, Porous materials, Silicate waste, X-ray microtomography

Introduction incorporated in a matrix material of similar composition

Ongoing concern over the disposal of silicate wastes
from the residues of power generation and the proces-
sing and manufacturing industries has led to a tremen-
dous amount of work over the last 40 years investigating
the feasibility of using these wastes as raw materials for
the production of glasses and glass ceramics.1 Various
methods have been used to produce cast or sintered glass
ceramics from a wide range of industrial silicate
wastes.1–11 Silicate wastes that have been used include
coal ash,2–4 incinerator fly ash5,6 and bottom ash,7
metallurgical slag,8–10 and other specific wastes from
zinc hydrometallurgy.11 There has always been a strong
emphasis on producing dense glass ceramic materials
with adequate mechanical properties in order to
compete with commercially available materials for use
in building, for example floor and wall tiles and
architectural panels, and other specialised applications.
On the other hand, it is equally important and
interesting to utilise these wastes as a source material
for the production of highly porous, foamed, glass
ceramics.
Porous materials have low density, low thermal
conductivity, high surface area, good thermal shock
resistance and high specific strength. Hence, they are
often used as thermal insulators, lightweight structural
components, filters, absorbents, gas sensors and heat
exchangers.12–14 Various techniques have been applied
to produce porous materials with open or closed
porosity. Hollow glass microspheres have been
1
Department of Materials, Imperial College London, Exhibition Road,
London SW7 2AZ, UK
*Corresponding author, email a.boccaccini@imperial.ac.uk
to create uniformly spherical or near spherical isolated
pores in the sintered material.15,16 However, there are
limitations on the compositions of microspheres avail-
able. Microwave processing has also been used to form
closed pores in a glass matrix composite material17 by
inducing heat, concentrated enough to form gas in the
molten core of the sample, while the sample retains its
shape owing to the temperature loss and thus lower
temperature near the surface. However, there is a limit
to the size of specimens suitable for this technique.
Another method of producing closed porous materials
was demonstrated by Hayashi et al.,18 who fabricated
porous PZT ceramics with controlled porosity by burn-
ing out spherical polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA)
particles, which were mixed with the starting powder
before compacting. Instead of using individual poly-
meric particles, continuous, porous, polymeric preforms
have been utilised as pore creators in a number of studies
on the fabrication of open porous glass ceramic materials
from pure constituents19 or waste materials.20,21
By far the simplest technique for producing porous
ceramics is based on powder sintering with the incorpo-
ration of foaming agents, which is also the method
employed in the present investigation. Incorporation of
foaming agents generates porosity by emitting gas
during reaction at elevated temperatures. There are
two types of foaming agents, solid and liquid. For
example, carbon black or petroleum coke can be mixed
with ceramic powder to increase open porosity.22 The
degree of open porosity and the shape and size of pores
made by this method depend on the volume of foaming
agents incorporated and on the shape and size of
individual particles respectively.23 With solid foaming
agents it is difficult to create ultrafine isolated porosity

ß 2006 Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining

Published by Maney on behalf of the Institute
Received 6 June 2005; accepted 3 August 2005
32 Advances in Applied Ceramics 2006 VOL 105 NO 1 DOI 10 . 1179/174367606X81632

(,50 mm pore diameter) because of agglomeration of
the foaming agent. Liquid foaming agents, such as liquid
paraffin, do not have such a problem and have been used
to create very fine, submicrometre pores in ultrafine
powder compacts.24,25 Nevertheless, in order to main-
tain simplicity and thus favourable economics for recy-
cling waste materials, it was decided in the present
investigation that solid foaming agents should be
incorporated using the powder sintering method to
create macroporosity in the sintered products. The high
level of porosity is designed to provide better insulating
behaviour in both thermal and acoustic applications,
while the mechanical properties of a glass ceramic
material should provide structural stability.
In addition to other solid foaming agents, carbona-
ceous solids and carbonates have been used as foaming
agents in various studies.26–31 Abe et al.27 added coal
powder to fly ash to produce porous cordierite ceramics.
The size and shape of pores were approximately the
same as those of the original coal powder particles, and
thus pore size could be controlled in the range 50–
1000 mm. Cathode ray tubes were recycled and mixed
with 5 wt-%CaCO3 to produce foam glass.29 A similar
approach was used by Gorokhovsky et al.,30 who
produced foamed glass ceramics by sintering mixtures
of wastes with addition of 5 wt-% limestone. It has also
been demonstrated that silicon carbide, which decom-
poses at 950–1150uC, is a very effective foaming agent.31
The carbide can be oxidised to form CO2 and CO gas
bubbles, which are formed in a viscous matrix, and the
component retains its shape during cooling. Typical
reactions leading to the formation of pores by gas
evolution are represented by:
SiCz2O2 <SiO2 zCO2
SiCzO2 <SiO2 zCO
As mentioned above, much work has been carried out in
recent years to produce dense glass ceramics from waste
materials with improved mechanical, thermal, chemical
and physical properties. The intention has been to
obtain glass ceramics competitive enough in terms of
properties to replace or act as an alternative to existing
commercial glass ceramics and/or building and struc-
tural materials in general. Sometimes, because of the
complexity of these wastes, preproduction refinements,
which may complicate and increase the cost of a
recycling process, are needed in order to yield a waste
material or a combination of wastes that is worth
recycling into a dense material. On the other hand, if
pores in a material can be exploited to achieve a certain
function or property, e.g. sound or thermal insulation,
then porous materials become a viable option for
reusing waste without a (usually costly) refining step.
Current research should demonstrate not only that it is
feasible to reuse silicate waste in the production of
foamed glass ceramics, it should also confirm the
versatility of the chosen processing method, which
should be applicable to many different types of
industrial wastes with minor adjustments to parameters
such as chemical composition, type and amount of
foaming agent, and variables in the heat treatment
process.
The present paper thus examines the relationship
between processing conditions and resulting pore
Wu et al. Glass ceramic foams from coal ash and waste glass
morphology and mechanical properties of foamed glass
ceramics produced from selected mixtures of coal pond
ash and waste glass cullet using SiC as foaming agent.
The silicate wastes used, considered as model systems for
the present investigation, originated in New Zealand,
however the method developed is applicable to other
wastes or combinations of wastes. The match between
the glass softening temperature and the decomposition
temperature of the foaming agent is the key to obtaining
the best foaming result by maintaining distinct gas
bubbles, and thus final porosity, during sintering. It is
also demonstrated that X-ray microtomography (XMT)
is a powerful, non-destructive tool for investigating the
pore morphology of highly porous silicate based
materials. Although there has been work done using
XMT on a silicate bioactive glass32 and glass ceramic
foams,14 this is the first time XMT has been used in
waste derived technical porous glass ceramics, and
emphasis was placed on developing quantitative analysis
of XMT scans for such materials.
Experimental procedures
Raw materials
The coal pond ash used was a mixture of bottom ash
and fly ash which had been stored and weathered in
designated water ponds close to the thermal power
station in Huntly, New Zealand. The chemical
composition (wt-%) of the pond ash was: 59.2SiO2–
19.0Al2O3–7.5Fe2O3–8.7CaO–1.6MgO–1.5TiO2–0.5K2O–
0.3Na2O–0.3P2O5–0.1MnO. The waste bottle glass was
supplied by a recycling plant in Christchurch, New
Zealand. Typical chemical composition (wt-%) of the
soda lime glass was: 72SiO2–1Al2O3–9CaO–3MgO–
15Na2O. The optimised composition for production of
glass ceramic foams with the best outcome in terms of
foaming was found from preliminary experiments. This
composition contained 80% waste glass cullet and 20%
coal pond ash by weight, and will be referred to below
as PA80G. The chemical composition (wt-%) of this
mixture was: 65SiO2–4Al2O3–2Fe2O3–13CaO–1MgO–
0.5TiO2–0.5K2O–13Na2O. Fine (5–25 mm) SiC particu-
late (Lonza-Werke GmbH, Waldshut-Tiengen, Germany)
was incorporated in the starting mixture as the foaming
agent, in quantities of 2 and 5 wt-%.
Processing
Each sintering experiment was carried out in duplicate
at different temperatures in the range 975–1100uC, with
a holding time of 5 min. A heating rate of 30 K min21
and a cooling rate of 10 K min21 were used. The
powder mixture was cold compacted without binders at
100 MPa in a 10 mm diameter steel die with a green
pellet weight of approximately 0.3 g.
Phase identification
The crystalline phases of sintered foams were identified
by X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis (Philips X-ray
diffractometer with PW1719 X-ray generator) on
powdered samples, using Cu Ka radiation in the 2h
range from 15 to 65u. The step size of each scan was
0.04u with 2 s per step. The identification was carried out
by comparing the peak positions and intensities with
those in the Joint Committee on Powder Diffraction
Standards (JCPDS) data files. Phase identification and
Advances in Applied Ceramics 2006 VOL 105 NO 1 33
Wu et al. Glass ceramic foams from coal ash and waste glass
microstructural analysis were also carried out by the use
of scanning electron microscopy (SEM) involving both
backscattered electron (BSE) imaging (Jeol JSM
5610LV) and energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDS)
(Jeol JSM 840).
X-ray microtomography and image analysis
X-ray microtomography (XMT) is a non-destructive
method that utilises the penetrating power of X-rays to
acquire three-dimensional structural information.32 This
is achieved by taking a series of 2D digital radiographs
from a rotating specimen with a fixed X-ray source and
then using a back projection algorithm to reconstruct a
3D image by combining the attenuation intensities at
each angle. In microtomography, the sample is placed
close to the source and far from the image intensifier,
allowing geometrical enlargement to be used to increase
magnification. However, the resolution is dependent
upon the focal spot size of the electrons on the target
which generates the X-rays. The commercial unit used
(Phoenix X-ray Systems and Services GmbH) can run
with a 1 mm spot size, allowing practical resolutions of
about 2 mm voxels. (In 2D imaging the basic unit of the
composition of an image on a television screen,
computer monitor or similar display is a pixel.
Similarly, for 3D digital imaging the basic unit is a
‘voxel’, derived from a combination of the words
‘volume’ and ‘pixel’.) The Phoenix unit is a compact
ultrahigh resolution microfocus X-ray tomography sys-
tem dedicated to the 3D inspection of small specimens.
In the present investigation, a piece of foam (around
56565 mm3) from each sintering temperature was
mounted on a rotating sample holder. XMT was carried
out on samples with 2 wt-%SiC, heat treated at 975,
1000, 1050 and 1100uC for 5 min each. Owing to the
large size of the pores in the samples it was decided to
use a voxel size of about 10 mm. At this resolution a
sufficiently large volume of the sample could be scanned
so that at least 20 pores (for the sample with largest
average pore size) were quantified, allowing the statis-
tical variation in size to be determined. The resulting
three-dimensional reconstructions were cropped digi-
tally to remove edge artefacts and analysed quantita-
tively, both in 3D using VGStudio Max 2.0 (Volume
Graphics GmbH, Germany) data. Sequential analysis of
2D slices from the data set were also quantified using
ImageTool 3.0 (University of Texas Health Science
Center at San Antonio, TX, USA). Both packages were
used to determine the pore morphology of the recon-
structed specimens, i.e. average pore size, size distribu-
tion, porosity, roundness/sphericity of pores and wall
thickness.
It is important to note that before quantification is
carried out, the acquired 2D and 3D data must be
treated. The treatment includes, first, a filtering process
which removes unwanted artefacts as well as smooths
across a single material and the boundary between
different materials (air and glass ceramic, in this case).
This is followed by ‘thresholding’, which is a process to
simplify the image into black and white pixels for the 2D
and voxels for the 3D data. The quality of the final
image is highly dependent on the filters applied. Finally,
for this particular study, interconnections between pores
gave rise to the problem of measuring the true pore
diameter. Therefore, a process involving dilation and
34 Advances in Applied Ceramics 2006 VOL 105 NO 1
1 Photograph of as cut glass ceramic foams sintered at
1000uC (left) and 1050uC
erosion operations was carried out. The basic principle
behind these two operations is that the process will
either add (dilate) or remove (erode) a number of pixels
on the surface of a feature (e.g. a feature of black pixels
in a white pixel dominated matrix), depending on the
condition set by the user. As a result of a series of
dilation operations, what was a window/interconnection
between two pores will be closed along with the growth
of pore wall thickness, i.e. smaller pores. Erosion is
applied so that the pore size can be returned to its
original state, while the pores remain closed. This is
due to the fact that dilation and erosion operations only
act on pixels on the boundary. When the image data
finally reach the desired state, quantitative analysis can
be carried out automatically by packages such as
ImageTool and VGStudio.
Properties of foamed glass ceramic materials
Apparent density was determined by measuring the mass
of a 10610610 mm3 (nominal dimensions) specimen
for each processing condition. The compressive strength
of the sintered materials was measured using a Zwick
Benchtop compression tester with a 10 kN load cell at a
crosshead speed of 5 mm min21. At least two samples of
each composition and heat treatment condition were
tested. Each specimen was cut using a hacksaw and
refined with SiC abrasive paper to form cubes of size 10–
12 mm. The thermal shock resistance of the foamed
glass ceramic was determined by measuring the residual
compressive strength with respect to quenching tem-
perature DT, which is the difference between the furnace
temperature and water temperature. Duplicates were
quenched in water for each sintering condition after
stabilising at various temperatures in the range 175–
700uC for 5 min. Dilatometry (Netzsch dilatometer) was
used to measure the coefficient of thermal expansion of
selected samples using 25 mm long and 5 mm diameter
specimens.
Results and discussion
Physical properties
The typical structures of foams sintered at 1000 and
1050uC are shown in Fig. 1. The process produces
foamed glass ceramic material that is highly porous and
thus extremely lightweight. The foams exhibited a
relatively homogeneous porous structure with minimal
agglomeration, clustering of large pores or other irregu-
larities. The apparent density of the material reduced

2 Summary of results (filtered XMT data) illustrating
effect of sintering temperature on apparent density
and porosity of material PA80G with 2 wt-%SiC
from 0.35 to 0.18 g cm23 with increasing sintering
temperature (up to 1100uC). This is consistent with the
XMT results (Fig. 2), which show that percentage
porosity increased with sintering temperature. The
coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) was measured
using dilatometry for a sample sintered at 1000uC.
Between 30 and 500uC, CTE is 8.661026 K21.
Phase identification
The starting material, PA80G, was partially amorphous
with trace amounts of crystalline quartz coming from
both pond ash and the waste glass constituent. Extensive
XRD analysis on samples of PA80G and PA80G
foamed with 2 wt-%SiC (Fig. 3) indicated that the main
crystalline phase after heat treatment was wollastonite-
2M (CaSiO3) (JCPDS-ICDD 27-0088) regardless of the
heat treatment temperature. The degree of crystal-
lisation (percentage volume of wollastonite crystals in
the material) was approximately 15%, as determined by
image analysis. There was no detectable SiO2 in the
foamed samples whereas the sintered PA80G sample
without addition of SiC contained a significant amount
of crystalline SiO2 (cristobalite) (JCPDS-ICDD 47-
0718). This absence of SiO2 in the foamed material
3 XRD analysis illustrating crystalline phases (& wollas-
tonite, m SiO2) present in PA80G at different sintering
temperatures: a 1100uC, 2 wt-%SiC; b 1050uC, 2 wt-%SiC;
c 1025uC, 2 wt-%SiC; d 1025uC, no foaming agent
Wu et al. Glass ceramic foams from coal ash and waste glass
N
4 XRD patterns showing residual SiC ( SiC, JCPDS-
ICDD 49-1428) detectable by XRD when excess amount
of foaming agent is used in PA80G with a 5 wt-%SiC,
b 2 wt-%SiC
may be explained by reference to the following reaction:
SiCz2SiO2 <3SiOzCO
There is thus a possibility that, at relatively high
sintering temperatures, crystalline SiO2 reacted with
SiC to produce gaseous SiO and CO. Therefore, in both
cases (sintered with and without SiC), it is assumed that
some of the SiO2 was consumed and contributed to the
crystallisation of CaSiO3 despite the low calcium content
(Ca/Si ratio around 0.2) present in the matrix glass.
Furthermore, it was found (Fig. 4) that there was a
significantly greater level of residual SiC in the sintered
material when 5 wt-%SiC was incorporated instead of
2 wt-%. That is, under the same processing conditions,
the reaction involving SiC appeared to be limited by
either time or the presence in the base material of other
phases that act as reactants. Therefore, there is no
benefit in using large additions of SiC; low quantities
((2 wt-%) of the foaming agent are sufficient.
Microstructural analysis was carried out using SEM
in backscattered electron (BSE) mode. Figure 5 shows
the degree of crystallisation of the foamed glass ceramic
material after heat treatment at 1100uC for 5 min. The
fine crystals, shown as bright features in Fig. 5, were
5 SEM image of fine wollastonite crystals embedded in
the glass matrix of a pore wall in PA80G glass ceramic
foam with 2 wt-%SiC, sintered at 1100uC
Advances in Applied Ceramics 2006 VOL 105 NO 1 35
Wu et al. Glass ceramic foams from coal ash and waste glass

6 SEM image of the cross-section of PA80G glass cera-

mic foam with 2 wt-%SiC, heat treated at 1050uC

confirmed as CaSiO3 by chemical analysis using EDS.

The crystallisation of CaSiO3 was found to be uniformly
distributed across the glass matrix. There was, however,
no sign of surface nucleation, as originally expected,
despite the very large surface area to volume ratio in this
material (for example, the sample PA80Gz2 wt-%SiC
foamed at 1050uC had a surface area S to volume V
ratio of 4.8 mm21, whilst for a fully dense 56565 mm3
cube S/V51.2 mm21). b

Pore morphology
The conventional method of examining the pore
morphology of a highly porous material requires
different microscopy techniques depending on the size
of pores. Figure 6 shows a typical SEM image of a cross-
section of a porous material produced in the present
study (PA80G with 2 wt-%SiC sintered at 1050uC). The
disadvantage of using such an imaging technique to
analyse pore morphology is not only that the magnifica-
tions readily available in an SEM are too high for
samples with relatively large pores (.500 mm), but also
that the sample has to be physically sectioned and
polished for a different region to be examined. This is c
also the case for optical microscopy.
7 2D (axial, x–y) XMT images of the same cross-section
By contrast, Fig. 7 shows a typical 2D slice from a 3D
of PA80G glass ceramic foam with 2 wt-%SiC sintered
XMT data set, together with the results of applying
at 1100uC: a original (as reconstructed); b processed
image analysis to remove interconnects for better
using less aggressive convolution operation (three
estimation of pore size and its distribution via a series
iterations); c processed using more aggressive opera-
of dilation/erosion operations. Using these morphologi-
tion (nine iterations)
cal operators, several dilation operations are performed
growing all of the walls such that in the smaller pores
they touch, the voids are completely removed. The same 975–1100uC, as shown in Fig. 8. The irregularity of the
number of erosion operations is then performed, sample heat treated at 975uC can be explained by the
reopening the larger pores to their original state. lack of fluidity, i.e. high viscosity, of the matrix material,
However, the smaller pores have no void left from leading to poor foaming. Foaming was much improved
which the erosion can initiate, hence they remain closed. at temperatures of 1000–1050uC, and the pores became
This results in the larger pores remaining essentially much more spherical. With increasing temperature, the
unaffected by filtering, whilst small pores and inter- agglomeration or coalescence of pores occurred as pore
connects are closed. A comparison between images size increased, as shown in the images.
before and after filtering gives a good indication of the Figure 9 demonstrates the versatility of using XMT to
relative proportion of small pores to larger pores.33 In examine the structure of a material. The pores can be
the present work, less than 5% of the porosity was shaded in different colours in terms of their volume,
associated with small pores. identified and measured individually. This provides a
It was possible to detect a dramatic change in convenient qualitative system of checking for interconnec-
pore morphology over the small temperature range of tions, if any, which have larger volumes than single pores.

36 Advances in Applied Ceramics 2006 VOL 105 NO 1


a c
b d
2
8 2D filtered XMT images (565 mm ) taken from axial
planes of PA80G glass ceramic foam with 2 wt-%SiC,
sintered at a 975uC, b 1000uC, c 1050uC, d 1100uC
The porosity level varied from 70 to 90% with
increasing sintering temperature. As shown in Fig. 10,
pores at 1000uC were much smaller and more uniformly
distributed than at 1100uC. As mentioned above, the
type of filter and number of iterations used on the
reconstructed model affect the porosity level measured
by image analysis software by less than 5%. It is
therefore still valid to state that the results of image
analysis indicate that the porosity (Fig. 2) and pore
morphology (Fig. 11), i.e. pore size and roundness/
sphericity, are all positive functions of sintering tem-
perature. The roundness of the pores improved with
temperature since the viscosity of the base material
PA80G was low enough for near spherical gas bubbles
to form and retain their shapes.
9 Illustration of 3D pore analysis of PA80G glass cera-
mic foam with 2 wt-%SiC sintered at 1050uC, with indi-
vidual pores detected and colour coded by volume
Wu et al. Glass ceramic foams from coal ash and waste glass
b
10 Three-dimensional microtomographic reconstruction
of the structure of a PA80G glass ceramic foam with
2 wt-%SiC heat treated at a 1000uC and b 1100uC
The average wall thickness between pores was another
parameter measured by XMT and showed a consistent
trend as sintering temperature increased. The walls are
expected to be thicker as the number of pores decreases
with increasing temperature, while the same total
amount of material is available to produce the walls.
The pore size distribution of the filtered specimens, as
shown in Fig. 12, shifted towards the higher end with
sintering temperature. The area under the curve
decreases with the shift, but this is due to the semi-log
scale as well as the number of pores decreasing with
increasing pore size given the same volume. Samples
sintered at 1000 and 1050uC had a smaller spread in
terms of size range, i.e. they had more uniformly
distributed pores as shown by the cross-sectional images.
11 Summary of results (filtered XMT data) illustrating the
effect of sintering temperature on wall thickness,
roundness/sphericity and average pore size of glass
ceramic foam PA80G with 2 wt-%SiC
Advances in Applied Ceramics 2006 VOL 105 NO 1 37
Wu et al. Glass ceramic foams from coal ash and waste glass
12 Distribution of pore size (equivalent spherical dia-
meter) of PA80G foamed glass ceramic sintered at
various temperatures (filtered XMT data)
For samples sintered at 975uC, the non-uniformity can
be deduced from the low roundness value and large size
range, i.e. from 0.06 to 1 mm. Overall, samples sintered
at 1100uC had the largest spread, with pore size ranging
from 0.2 to 3 mm.
Mechanical properties
The system chosen for mechanical property character-
isation had 2 wt-%SiC foaming agent and was heat
treated at 1000uC for 5 min, which gave uniform pore
morphology. Results of thermal shock tests showed a
gradual reduction in compressive strength (from 1.5 to
0.6 MPa) with increasing DT (Fig. 13), which is the
expected behaviour of a material with large numbers of
defects, in this case pores. In the case of dense materials,
there is often a thermal resistance limit (critical tem-
perature) above which the mechanical properties of the
thermally shocked material are significantly inferior to
those of the as received one. In addition, it was found
that the compressive strength of samples sintered at
1100uC was only about 0.2 MPa, and this strength
reduction is thought to be caused by the reduction in
apparent density and increase in pore size. The relatively
good compressive strength of foams sintered at 1000uC
for 5 min is another indication of the suitability of
the foaming process developed. The compressive
strengths of the sintered foams are in the range 1.2–
1.7 MPa. This is comparable if not superior to recently
produced glass foams (0.7–4.5 MPa)29 and glass ceramic
foams (,0.5 MPa).14 From these previous studies, it
appears that composition and heat treatment time are
the two other factors apart from porosity that affect
mechanical strength. Given that the foams produced in
the present study were only subjected to a relatively
short sintering time, and that the sintering temperatures
employed are unlikely to coincide with optimum crystal-
lisation temperature, it may be possible to improve
the mechanical properties of these foams by further
heat treatment at a lower crystallisation temperature,
i.e. to increase the degree of crystallinity. It has also
been shown that the XMT data are comprehensive and
also valuable for future work where modelling and
simulation of mechanical and thermal behaviour is
required to tailor the pore structure for applications
such as thermal/sound insulation and impact absorbing
panels.
38 Advances in Applied Ceramics 2006 VOL 105 NO
13 Variation of compressive strength of PA80G glass
ceramic foams with 2 wt-%SiC sintered at 1000uC with
increasing quenching temperature DT
Conclusion
A wide range of lightweight, highly porous wollastonite
glass ceramics have been produced economically using
the powder sintering method, with coal pond ash and
waste glass cullet as raw materials. Fine (5–25 mm)
silicon carbide powder was shown to be an excellent
foaming agent for materials such as the present glass-
ceramics with a high sintering temperature. X-ray micro-
tomography enabled the pore morphology of samples
to be examined accurately and non-destructively. The
production of highly porous glass ceramics has been
demonstrated as a viable prospect for disposal of
industrial silicate wastes.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Genesis Power (Huntly,
New Zealand) and Recovered Materials Foundation
(Christchurch, New Zealand) for supplying the waste
materials, and the Tertiary Education Commission of
the New Zealand government for financial sponsorship
for one of the authors (JPW).
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