Fabrication and characterization of ceramic membrane by gel cast technique for water filtration

Abstract

Sayong ball clay membrane can be fabricated witho ut the assistance of high-tech sophisticated machineries and complicated productio n methods make the filters particularly attractive as a point-of-use treatment. This work was concerned with the study of Sayong ball clay as a wastewater filtration membrane by Gel Cast tec hnique. Gel cast involves mixing process of Sayong ball clay with the solvent, monomer, dispers ant, initiator and catalyst in a certain composition. Tubular membrane was designed and fabr icated by controlling the Gel Cast monomer (5, 10, 15, 20 wt% of MAM). The physical measuremen ts (shrinkage, apparent porosity, bulk density), microstructure analysis, filtration proce ss (flow rate) and water quality assessments (pH, color, COD, SS) were carried out at different wt% o f MAM. The experimental results showed that the apparent porosity and bulk density of Sayong Ball Clay produced by Gel Cast with 5 wt% MAM were 15.39% and 1.87 g/cm 3 , respectively. It gives improvement in water quali ty with the lowest suspended solid (192 mg/L), lowest COD (4 mg /L) and most colorless (1.1 Gardner units) filtered wastewater as compared to others. For micr ostructure, the porosity increases with increasing MAM wt%. Changes in MAM wt% are likely to have some effect in filtration process as increases the MAM wt% will increases the flow rate of filtere d wastewater due to the higher porosity.