The influence of MgO addition on the densification and microstructure of alumina (Al₂O₃) was studied. Compacted alumina specimens were manufactured using ball-milling and one-directional pressing followed by sintering at temperatures below 1700oC. Relative density, shrinkage, hardness, and microstructure were investigated using analytical tools such as FE-SEM, EDS, and XRD. When the MgO was added up to 5.0 wt% and sintered at 1500°C and 1600°C, the relative density exhibited an average value of 97% or more at both temperatures. The maximum density of 99.2% was with the addition of 0.5 wt% MgO at 1500°C. Meanwhile, the specimens showed significantly lower density values when sintered at 1400°C than at 1500°C and 1600°C owing to the relatively low sintering temperature. The hardness and shrinkage data also showed a similar trend in the change in density, implying that the addition of approximately 0.5 wt% MgO can promote the densification of Al₂O₃. Studying the microstructure confirmed the uniformity of the sintered alumina. These results can be used as basic compositional data for the development of MgOcontaining alumina as high-dielectric insulators.

Thermal protection systems (TPS) are a group of materials that are indispensable for protecting spacecraft from the aerodynamic heating occurring during entry into an atmosphere. Among candidate materials for TPS, ceramic insulation materials are usually considered for reusable TPS. In this study, ceramic insulation materials, such as alumina enhanced thermal barrier (AETB), are fabricated via typical ceramic processing from ceramic fiber and additives. Mixtures of silica and alumina fibers are used as raw materials, with the addition of B4C to bind fibers together. Reaction-cured glass is also added on top of AETB to induce water-proof functionality or high emissivity. Some issues, such as the elimination of clumps in the AETB, and processing difficulties in the production of reusable surface insulation are reported as well.

In this work, ultra-fine calcium oxide (CaO) powder derived from eggshells is used as the starting material to synthesize mineral trioxide aggregate (MTA). The prepared CaO powder is confirmed to have an average particle size of 500 nm. MTAs are synthesized with three types of fine CaO-based powders, namely, tricalcium silicate (C3S), dicalcium silicate (C2S), and tricalcium aluminate (C3A). The synthesis behavior of C3S, C2S and C3A with ultra-fine CaO powder and the effects of C₃A content and curing time on the properties of MTA are investigated. The characteristics of the synthesized MTA powders are examined by X-ray diffraction (XRD), field emission-scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM), and a universal testing machine (UTM). The microstructure and compressive strength characteristics of the synthesized MTA powders are strongly dependent on the C3A wt.% and curing time. Furthermore, MTA with 5 wt.% C3A is found to increase the compressive strength and shorten the curing time.

In this study, a process is developed for 3D printing with alumina (Al₂O₃). First, a photocurable slurry made from nanoparticle Al₂O₃ powder is mixed with hexanediol diacrylate binder and phenylbis(2,4,6-trimethylbenzoyl) phosphine oxide photoinitiator. The optimum solid content of Al₂O₃ is determined by measuring the rheological properties of the slurry. Then, green bodies of Al₂O₃ with different photoinitiator contents and UV exposure times are fabricated with a digital light processing (DLP) 3D printer. The dimensional accuracy of the printed Al₂O₃ green bodies and the number of defects are evaluated by carefully measuring the samples and imaging them with a scanning electron microscope. The optimum photoinitiator content and exposure time are 0.5 wt% and 0.8 s, respectively. These results show that Al₂O₃ products of various sizes and shapes can be fabricated by DLP 3D printing.

Vertically oriented nickel nanowire arrays with a different diameter and length are synthesized in porous anodic aluminium oxide templates by an electrodeposition method. The pore diameters of the templates are adjusted by controlling the anodization conditions and then they are utilized as templates to grow nickel nanowire arrays. The nickel nanowires have the average diameters of approximately 25 and 260 nm and the crystal structure, morphology and microstructure of the nanowires are systematically investigated using XRD, FE-SEM and TEM analysis. The nickel nanowire arrays show a magnetic anisotropy with the easy axis parallel to the nanowires and the coercivity and remanence enhance with decreasing a wire diameter and increasing a wire length.

The powder injection molding process having advantages in manufacturing three-dimensional precision parts essentially requires a debinding process before sintering to remove the binders used for preparing feedstock. In this study, powder injection molding of translucent alumina was performed, and carbon dioxide (CO₂) is used as a supercritical fluid that makes it possible to remove a large amount of binder, which is paraffin wax. The relationship between the optical property of translucent alumina and the debinding condition (temperature and pressure) of supercritical CO₂ was investigated. As temperature and pressure increased, extraction rate of the binder showed rising tendency and average grain size after sintering process was relatively fine. On the other hand, optical transmittance was reduced. As a result, the debinding condition at 50° and 20 MPa that represents the lowest extraction rate, 8.19 × 10⁻³ m²/sec, corresponds to the largest grain size of 14.7 μm and the highest optical transmittance of 45.2%.

Citations

Citations to this article as recorded by  

• Experimental and numerical analysis of effects of supercritical carbon dioxide debinding on Inconel 718 MIM components
  Dugauguez Olivier, Agne Aboubabky, Jimenez-Morales Antonia, Torralba José Manuel, Barriere Thierry
  Powder Technology.2019; 355: 57.     CrossRef

Translucent alumina is a potential candidate for high temperature application as a replacement of the glass or polymer. Recently, due to the increasing demand of high power light emitting diode (LED), there is a growing interest in the translucent alumina. Since the translucent property is very sensitive to the internal defect, such as voids inside or abnormal grain growth of sintered alumina, it is important to fabricate the defect-free product through the fabrication process. Powder injection molding (PIM) has been commonly applied for the fabrication of complex shaped products. Among the many parameters of PIM, the flowability of powder/binder mixture becomes more significant especially for the shape of the cavity with thin thickness. Two different positions of the gate were applied during PIM using the disc type of die. The binder was removed by solvent extraction method and the brown compact was sintered at 1750°C for 3 hours in a vacuum. The flowability was also simulated using moldflow (MPI 6.0) with two different types of gate. The effect of the flowability of powder/binder mixture on the microstructure of the sintered specimen was studied with the analysis of the simulation result.