SiC-based composite materials with light weight, high durability, and high-temperature stability have been actively studied for use in aerospace and defense applications. Moreover, environmental barrier coating (EBC) technologies using oxide-based ceramic materials have been studied to prevent chemical deterioration at a high temperature of 1300°C or higher. In this study, an ytterbium silicate material, which has recently been actively studied as an environmental barrier coating because of its high-temperature chemical stability, is fabricated on a sintered SiC substrate. Yb2O3 and SiO2 are used as the raw starting materials to form ytterbium disilicate (Yb2Si2O7). Suspension plasma spraying is applied as the coating method. The effect of the mixing method on the particle size and distribution, which affect the coating formation behavior, is investigated using a scanning electron microscope (SEM), an energy dispersive spectrometer (EDS), and X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis. It is found that the originally designed compounds are not effectively formed because of the refinement and vaporization of the raw material particles, i.e., SiO2, and the formation of a porous coating structure. By changing the coating parameters such as the deposition distance, it is found that a denser coating structure can be formed at a closer deposition distance.
Citations
A thick film of Li7La3Zr2O12 (LLZO) solid-state electrolyte is fabricated using the tape casting process and is compared to a bulk specimen in terms of the density, microstructure, and ion conductivity. The final thickness of LLZO film after sintering is 240 μm which is stacked up with four sheets of LLZO green films including polymeric binders. The relative density of the LLZO film is 83%, which is almost the same as that of the bulk specimen. The ion conductivity of a LLZO thick film is 2.81 × 10−4 S/cm, which is also similar to that of the bulk specimen, 2.54 × 10−4 S/ cm. However, the microstructure shows a large difference in the grain size between the thick film and the bulk specimen. Although the grain boundary area is different between the thick film and the bulk specimen, the fact that both the ion conductivities are very similar means that no secondary phase exists at the grain boundary, which is thought to originate from nonstoichiometry or contamination.
Citations
Porous thick film of alumina which is fabricated by freeze tape casting using a camphene-camphor-acrylate vehicle. Alumina slurry is mixed above the melting point of the camphene-camphor solvent. Upon cooling, the camphene-camphor crystallizes from the solution as particle-free dendrites, with the Al2O3 powder and acrylate liquid in the interdendritic spaces. Subsequently, the acrylate liquid is solidified by photopolymerization to offer mechanical properties for handling. The microstructure of the porous alumina film is characterized for systems with different cooling rate around the melting temperature of camphor-camphene. The structure of the dendritic porosity is compared as a function of ratio of camphene-camphor solvent and acrylate content, and Al2O3 powder volume fraction in acrylate in terms of the dendrite arm width.