Effect of arctic environment on flexural behavior of fly ash cenosphere reinforced epoxy syntactic foams

In this paper, the effect of arctic conditions on the flexural response of cenosphere/epoxy syntactic foams is investigated. Understanding the behavior of such foams under extreme conditions is critical for exploring their suitability for constructing lightweight platforms used in arctic explorations. Such platforms are exposed to subzero temperatures for extended periods of time potentially degrading their mechanical properties. In the research study presented here, samples of cenosphere/epoxy syntactic foams were conditioned under arctic environment at −60 °C temperature for a period of 57 days. Flexural tests were then conducted at room temperature as well as in-situ −60 °C on the conditioned samples and compared against unconditioned samples. Combinations of surface modification and cenosphere volume fractions were considered. Experimental findings showed that an increase in flexural modulus can be observed at room temperature with increasing cenosphere volume content for both untreated and treated cenosphere reinforced syntactic foams. In contrast, a decrease in flexural strength was observed as compared to neat resin. For the case of arctic exposed samples, an apparent increase in flexural modulus was recorded between 7-15% as compared to room temperature cenospheres/epoxy syntactic foams. In addition, an apparent increase of 3-80% in the flexural strength was observed under arctic environment. The conditioning of cenosphere/epoxy syntactic foams under low temperatures manifested lower strains to failure as compared to neat epoxy and they exhibit quasi-brittle behavior leading to sudden failure in the post peak regime.