A silica-coated metal-organic framework/graphite-carbon nitride hybrid for improved fire safety of epoxy resins

Abstract To reduce the fire hazard of epoxy resin (EP), ZIF-67/g-C3N4@SiO2 (ZCS) hybrid material was prepared by electrostatic interaction and sol-gel method. The structure and morphology of ZCS were investigated by flourier transform infrared spectrometer, X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscope. It was found that the latent fire hazard of EP was reduced via the addition of ZCS hybrid material. The EP composite with 3 wt% of ZCS had better fire safety than EP. Cone results showed that the heat and smoke emissions of EP composites were reduced to varying degrees, and specifically their peak heat release rate, total heat release rate, peak smoke production rate and total smoke production were reduced by 46.8%, 21.7%, 45.2% and 19.3%, respectively. In addition, the possible flame retardance and smoke depression mechanism of ZCS hybrid material is also discussed in this article.