A new approach for production of anode microtubes as solid oxide fuel cell support

Abstract

In this study, a new inexpensive and simple technique has been developed to produce the anode microtubes used as a cell-support in the tubular SOFC system. NiO-GDC (nickel oxide–gadolinium doped ceria) rods with different binder contents were fabricated via thermoplastic extrusion. The rods were transformed into the tubular shape by wicking out the binder during the controlled debinding processing. This was achieved via processing at 600 °C and sintering at 1250 °C or 1400 °C respectively. The wall thickness of microtubes was determined by the content of the binder and the ceramic powders. The mean wall thickness values of fabricated microtubes were 219 µm, 272 µm, and 314 µm. The three-point bending test results show that the best mechanical strength with a bending stress of 164.52 MPa was achieved with the microtubes prepared from the batch 1 containing 20 wt% binder+surfactant and sintered at 1400 °C for 5 h.