Ceramics With High Fracture Toughness

Fracture toughness k1c is one of the most important mechanical properties of the ceramics which indicates the ability of the ceramic to resist crack propagation.

Ceramics with high fracture toughness.

The higher the fracture toughness the better the resistance to crack propagation. A polished surface of the material under test is indented using a vickers hardness tester the cracks which emanate from the corners or the indents are then measured and provide an indication of the toughness of the material. The fracture toughness of advanced ceramics is often measured using an indentation technique. Ceramic materials are characterized with respect to fracture toughness by measuring the energy required for a defect of known dimensions to propagate and become a crack.

Fine ceramics generally have low toughness. An understanding of the material s young s modulus and the length of the defect is required to measure what is known as the stress intensity factor. Compared with monolithic ceramics laminated ceramics showed multiple fractures instead of typical brittle fractures. Environmentally assisted subcritical crack extension slow crack growth scg and r curve behavior.

The fracture toughness of composites made by combining engineering ceramics with engineering polymers greatly exceeds the individual fracture toughness of the constituent materials. When evaluating ceramic or glass fracture toughness kic there are two major complications. Scg can cause stable crack extension at kiokic and thus can interfere with attempts to measure kic. However zirconia which is used to make ceramic knives exhibits high fracture toughness.

The fracture toughness of zirconia alumina and silicon nitride ceramics zirconia and alumina single crystals silicon carbide as well as silicon nitride ceramic particulate composites silicon nitride laminated composites and other ceramics materials were studied by a single edge v notched beam sevnb method.