Responsible disposal of vehicles at the end of life is a pressing environmental concern. In particular, waste plastic forms the largest proportion of non-recycled waste material from light-duty vehicles, and often ends up in a landfill. Here we report the upcycling of depolluted, dismantled and shredded end-of-life waste plastic into flash graphene using flash Joule heating. The synthetic process requires no separation or sorting of plastics and uses no solvents or water. We demonstrate the practical value of the graphene as a re-inforcing agent in automotive polyurethane foam composite, where its introduction leads to improved tensile strength and low frequency noise absorption properties. We demonstrate process continuity by upcycling the resulting foam composite back into equal-quality flash graphene. A prospective cradle-to-gate life cycle assessment suggests that our method may afford lower cumulative energy demand and water use, and a decrease in global warming potential compared to traditional graphene synthesis methods.
Polyurethane (PU) foams are used in various automotive applications due to their low cost and weight and highly tunable mechanical and physical properties. This article explores the effect of adding recycled thermoplastic elastomer (TPE) and recycled thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) powder collected from 3D printing waste as filler material on thermal stability and mechanical, physical, and sound absorption properties of flexible PU foam. The incorporation of TPE powder at low filler content, 2.5 wt%, increased the compression modulus by over 140%, tear resistance by over 25%, and Young's Modulus by 50% compared to the control. The addition of 2.5 wt% TPU powder increased the compression modulus by 61%, tear resistance by 31%, and Young's Modulus by 84%. The addition of TPU powder at 2.5 wt% showed improvement in sound absorption of plane waves (up to 20% at 2500 Hz) for a frequency range of 50–3500 Hz. Adding an additive manufacturing waste stream into PU foam as a filler reduced waste to landfill and created a superior foam product. This article exemplifies the benefits of creating a closed‐loop plastic industry to improve polymer materials and protect the earth.
Polyurethane foams (PU) are used in many automotive applications due to their durability and sound absorption properties. This paper examines the effects of reusing predominantly silica-filled thermoset composites as a reinforcing agent when ground to a particle size less than 106 μm (0%, 2.5%, 5%, 7.5% by wt%) on mechanical, physical, thermal, and sound absorption properties of PU foam. Young's modulus improved by 27%, and tensile strength increased by 18% with 7.5% reinforcement. Compression stress improved at 25%, 50%, and 65% strain by 37%, 41%, and 44%, respectively, with the 7.5% filler. Com-
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