Preparation and characterization of polyamide-6/CaCO3 hybrid hollow fiber membranes

Abstract

Polyamide-6(PA6)/CaCO 3 hollow fiber membranes were prepared by gel spinning from PA6/CaCO 3 /diluent system followed by cold-stretching. In virtue of the scanning electron microscopy (SEM), it is observed that the membrane present an asymmetric structure consisting of a dense skin, cellular cross-section and porous inner-surface. The porous structure was obtained by combining thermally induced phase separation (TIPS) process with interfacial micro-void mechanism, which has been seldom applied in membrane formation. Therefore, multi-porous structure derived from TIPS pores and interfacial micro-void. The Effects of CaCO 3 content, fixed-length heat-setting on properties of hollow fiber membranes such as water permeability, porosity, bubble point pore diameter were investigated. In three different CaCO 3 contents, the membrane with 30wt% CaCO 3 has the best comprehensive performance. In addition, fixed-length heat-setting was favorable to produce membrane with higher water permeability.