THERMAL BEHAVIOR OF CLAY COMPOSITES ENHANCED WITH ICHEKU AND MELON SHELL AGRO-WASTE ADDITIVES

The effect of agro-waste additives formulations African Velvet Tamarind (Icheku) and melon shells on Ehandiagu/Nkalaha clay blends was studied in this work. The clay samples collected from existing open mines, using digger and shovel, were cleaned, crushed using mortar and pestle and sieved with mechanized sieve arranged is descending order of fineness to obtain uniform particle sizes. The clay samples were soaked in a plastic container containing some quantities of de-ionized water. The water/clay mixture was vigorously stirred to ensure proper dissolution of the clay particles in water and the solution allowed settling for three days. The mixture was later filtered to remove unwanted materials and other debris in the mixture. The filtrate was allowed to settle for days and excess water decanted off. The clay obtained from this was sundried for three days and later oven dried at about 120oC for six hours. The resulting dry processed clay samples were ground and sieved to obtain uniform particle sizes. The icheku and melon shells were sundried for three days, pulverized and sieved to obtain uniform particle sizes. The chemical compositions of the melon shell, the African Velvet Tamarind (Icheku) shell and the clay samples were determined using XRF. The Ehandiagu and Nkalaha clay samples were blended in the ratios: 20:80; 60:40; 50:50. The ground icheku and melon shells additives were incorporated into the clay blends at 5%, 10%, 15%, 20% and 25%. The samples were mixed enough water to make it plastic for molding. The samples were molded into different shapes using wooden mould for refractoriness, modulus of rupture, thermal shock and linear shrinkage tests. The results obtained showed improvement in refractoriness by 4.61%, about 23.08% in linear shrinkage and about 3.32% in modulus of rupture.