Low temperature synthesis & amp; characterization of lead-free BCZT ceramics using molten salt method

Abstract

Piezoelectric properties are greatly influenced by the synthesis route, microstructure, stoichiometry of the chemical composition, purity of the starting materials. In this study, molten salt method was used to prepare lead-free BCZT ceramics. Molten salt method is one of the simplestmethods to prepare chemically-purified, single phase powders in high yield often at lower temperatures and shorten reaction time. Calcination of the molten salt synthesized powders resulted in asingle-phase perovskite structure at 1000 °C which is ∼ 350 °C less than the conventional solid-sate reaction method. With increasing calcination temperature the average template size was increased (∼ 0.5-2 μm). Formation of well dispersive templates improves the sinterability at lower temperatures. Lead-free BCZT ceramics sintered at 1500 °C for 2 h resulted in homogenous and highly dense microstructure with ∼92% of the theoretical density and a grain size of ∼ 35 μm. This highly dense microstructure could enhance the piezoelectric properties of the system.