Roller-compaction-assisted binder jetting of textured ceramics

Abstract

Texturing is an approach to tailoring the properties of materials along specific directions by arranging and growing grains directionally. In this work, a commercially available binder jetting machine equipped with the roller compaction feature was used to fabricate textured ceramics via templated grain growth. Two types of powders were prepared: one with 100 wt% alumina nanoparticles as the baseline, and the other with 75 wt% alumina nanoparticles as the matrix and 25 wt% alumina nanoplatelets as the templates for grain growth. The bulk density of the sintered samples with the alumina nanoplatelets was 4 % lower than that without them. The scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction results showed that morphological and crystallographic textures were achieved in the samples containing the alumina nanoplatelets. The flexural strength results indicated that the textured structure led to an improvement in the flexural strength, from 77 MPa to 124 MPa, despite the lower bulk density of the textured samples. This study demonstrates that commercially available binder jetting machines with the roller compaction feature can effectively produce textured ceramics with customized properties along desired directions.