Foam glasses development from glass bottles and eggshell

ABSTRACT The objective was the production of foam glasses obtained from glass bottles powder and eggshell as the foaming agent, thereby producing foam glasses composed entirely of recycled materials. Therefore, we investigated the influence of the sintering temperature, particle size of the glass and the foaming agent (wt %) in the volumetric expansion of the samples. They were formulated by adding 3% and 5% of foaming agent , using a standardized particle size by sieves mesh #100, #200 and #325, compressed in an uniaxially press (40 MPa). The sintering was made between 700 °C and 900 °C with 2,5 ºC/min rate. The characterization was made by volumetric expansion, density pore size and XRD (X-ray diffraction). It was verified the great importance of the glass particle size in the volume expansion of vitreous foams. The foaming agent influenced the percent expansion so that with 3% foaming agent was obtained the highest volumetric expansion values. Crystalline phases were observed for the samples burnt out at 800 °C and 900 °C as a signal of devitrification.