As artificial marble is abundant and widely used in residential and commercial fields, the resource utilization of artificial marble wastes (AMWs) has become extremely important in order to protect the environment. In this paper, polybutylene terephthalate/artificial marble wastes (PBT/AMWs) composites were prepared by melt blending to maximize resource utilization and increase PBT performance. The research results showed that the filling of AMWs was beneficial to the improvement of PBT-related performance. X-ray diffraction analysis results indicated that after filling AMWs into the PBT matrix, the crystal structure of PBT was not changed. Heat deflection temperature (HDT) analysis results indicated that the HDT of PBT composites with 20 wt% AMWs reached 66.68 °C, which was 9.12 °C higher than that of neat PBT. Differential scanning calorimetry analysis results showed that heterogeneous nucleation could be well achieved when the filling content was 15 wt%; impact and scanning electron microscope analysis results showed that due to the partial core-shell structure of the AMWs, the impact strength of PBT was significantly improved after filling. When the filling amount was 20 wt%, the impact strength of the PBT composites reached 23.20 kJ/m2, which was 17.94 kJ/m2 higher than that of neat PBT. This research will not only provide new insights into the efficient and high-value utilization of AMWs, but also provide a good reference for improved applications of other polymers.
The treatment of artificial marble wastes (AMWs) is a difficult aspect of the artificial marble industry and has enormous impacts on the environment. Herein, a series of polybutylene terephthalate (PBT)/AMWs composites were prepared by in situ polymerization. The effects of AMWs content (1–10 wt%) on the thermal stability, crystallization rate, and impact strength of the PBT/AMWs composites were investigated in detail. The results showed that the composites containing 10 wt% of AMWs exhibited the best performance. Due to the high thermal resistance and uniform distribution of the AMWs particles, the heat deflection temperature reached 67.40°C with optimal thermal stability. Additionally, under heterogeneous nucleation, the crystallization rate was also the highest, and impact strength reached 17.29 kJ/m2 due to the partial core-shell structure and hardened matrix effects of the AMWs particles.
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