Preparation and Characterization of Montmorillonite Particles under Calcination and Ball Milling Process
Martinus Heru Palmiyanto1, Kaleb Priyanto2

1Martinus Heru Palmiyanto, Mechanical Engineering Department, Akademi Teknologi Warga Surakarta, Sukoharjo, Indonesia.
2Kaleb Priyanto, Mechanical Engineering Department, Akademi Teknologi Warga Surakarta, Sukoharjo, Indonesia.

Manuscript received on 18 October 2018 | Revised Manuscript received on 27 October 2018 | Manuscript published on 30 October 2018 | PP: 38-41 | Volume-8 Issue-1, October 2018 | Retrieval Number: A5486108118/18©BEIESP
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© The Authors. Blue Eyes Intelligence Engineering and Sciences Publication (BEIESP). This is an open access article under the CC-BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)

Abstract: This study aims to produce nano-sized montmorillonite particles which will be developed as polymer composites fillers. Montmorillonite particles were sieved and then calcined. Ball Milling process was applied to montmorillonite to achieve better particle size. Analyzing using Particle size analyzer (PSA) was carried out on montmorillonite powder without calcination process, calcined montmorillonite powder, and calcined montmorillonite which had ball milling treatment for 5,000 cycles and 10,000 cycles. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) used to find out the structure of particles due to the type of treatment that has been applied. As a result, the PSA shows that the calcination treatment produces smaller particle sizes. The smaller particle size was shown by the results of PSA testing of calcined montmorillonite powder and subjected to ball milling treatment for 10,000 cycles. The micrograph results confirm this phenomenon, where particles of 200nm appear on the powder that has undergone calcination and ball mill treatment.
Keywords: Ball Milling, Calcination, Montmorillonite, PSA. 

Scope of the Article: Signal and Speech Processing