Glass Fiber Reinforced Polymer Decking
This information reflects our best understanding of product composition in 2015.
Glass fiber reinforced polymer (GFRP) parts can be used for a variety of construction applications. This CP focuses on decking material, but due to a lack of information for this specific product, some of the information comes from literature for...
Glass fiber reinforced polymer (GFRP) parts can be used for a variety of construction applications. This CP focuses on decking material, but due to a lack of information for this specific product, some of the information comes from literature for GFRP parts in general. Different types of resins can be used depending on the application requirements. This CP considers unsaturated polyester resin. Vinyl esters are also common; see CP 176 for information on vinyl ester resins. For certain applications of GFRP requiring fire ratings, halogenated polyesters and/or mineral flame retardants like antimony oxide and alumina trihydrate may be used; however, they were not found to be common for standard decking materials. GFRP decking is produced using a pultrusion process. This is a continuous process used to produce composite parts with a constant cross-sectional profile. The equipment feeds glass rovings and continuous strand mats into a resin bath. A surfacing veil is also applied and the pultrusion is pulled through forming/curing dies where polymerization takes place. At the end of the line, the profile is cut to desired length. Styrene is generally used as a crosslinking monomer as part of the resin bath. Some pultruders are making efforts to decrease styrene emission during manufacturing by using lower styrene resins or vapor supressed resins. This emissions in this CP are based on standard styrene content without vapor suppression. Residual styrene content in the finished product is very dependent on manufacturing conditions and may vary widely.