Preparation of organo clays thermally stable to be employed as filler in PET nano composites

Thermal stability of organically modified clays is fundamental to melt processing polymer nanocomposites, especially, poly(terephthalate ethylene) (PET). However, the use of organic salts with high thermal stability is factor essential to obtaining of organoclays with great thermal properties. This work has as purpose to evaluate the influence of organic modifier based on alkyl ammonium, alkyl phosphonium and aryl phosphonium, in the clay organic modification visa to improve thermal properties to use as filler in nanocomposites preparation, where temperatures at about 260 deg C will be employed. The most common, and commercially available, surfactants used for cation exchange reactions with montmorillonites, rendering them organophilic, are quaternary ammonium salts, that when present as cations in montmorillonite, typically begin degradation at above 200 deg C. However, organoclays prepared with quaternary alkyl phosphonium salts may be potentially useful for the organoclays preparation stable thermally. In this study bentonite clay from Bentonit Uniao Nordeste/PB was purified and organically modified with the organic salts reported above. Organoclays were characterized by X-ray fluorescence, X-ray diffraction, infrared spectroscopy and analysis thermogravimetry. The results shown that the samples modified with the salts based on phosphonium presented higher thermal stability that the alkyl ammonium salt. (author)