Enhancing Compressive Strength of Reticulated Porous Alumina by Optimizing Processing Conditions

Abstract

Recently, porous ceramics have received much attention from researchers because of their excellent thermal and chemical stabilities compared to their counterparts (such as porous polymers and metals), despite their inferior mechanical instability. Among the various types of porous ceramics, reticulated porous ceramics have significant industrial potential because of their synergistic high porosity and permeability. However, to the best of our knowledge, there is insufficient data on the processing conditions or preparing optimal reticulated porous alumina. Therefore, we prepared and characterized reticulated porous alumina specimens by controlling various processing conditions, namely average particle size, solid loading, binder, and dispersant. The data obtained were used to assess whether the compressive strength of the reticulated porous alumina could be enhanced and to discuss the potential of these materials for various applications.

Effect of the Sintering Temperature on the Compressive Strengths of Reticulated Porous Zirconia

“…Conversely, a nano-sized particle size is well densified, but agglomeration becomes severe such that sintering shrinkage and cracks are generated, reducing the compressive strength. Thus, zirconia with a sub-micron particle size was judged to be appropriate through other experimental results by the present researchers [26]. The particle size is a process variable for obtaining the optimum composition of reticulated porous zirconia specimens.…”

“…When the reticulated porous zirconia was sintered at 1400 • C, the compressive strength outcomes for each of the sample, from the as-received, coarse, intermediate, and fine zirconia particles, according to the change in the PPI value, are shown in Figure 9a. It has been reported that the larger the average particle size difference is, the more different the sintering behavior itself, and the finer the particles are, the more decreased the compressive strength becomes [26]. In addition, fine particles generally consist somewhat of agglomerated particles, causing non-uniformity and thus reducing the densification when sintered [28].…”