Pós nanométricos obtidos por moagem de alta energia utilizados para a obtenção de tialita: caracterização física, mecânica e microestrutural

Abstract

The Tialite (- Al2TiO5) has an excellent thermal shock resistance, high melting point, very low coefficient of reversible linear thermal expansion (25-1000C1,0x10-6 C-1), low thermal conductivity, as well as good resistance to attack by molten metal. Due to these technical features, this material has good potential for application concerning refractory segments such as applications in the foundry and automotive industries, thermocouples for non-ferrous, metal baths, and crucibles, among others. However, the tialite presents two critical issues: 1). It decomposes, giving rise to Al2O3-α and titanium oxide (rutile) by a eutectoid reaction at temperatures between 750 a 1300ºC and 2). The expansion crystal structure anisotropy, that promotes the low thermal expansion coefficients, provokes micro cracking, affecting the product’s mechanical strength. These two issues impact, the final tialite microstructure obtained by the conventional ceramic processing (that has grain size larger than 2 micros) demonstrating that it cannot avoid a micro cracking problem, resulting in the consequential weakening of the product. Through the High Energy Milling or Mechanical Alloying (MA), it is possible to obtain ultrafine powders, grains with nanometric dimensions, as well as a high homogeneity in the mixture and refined microstructure. In this study, it was investigated different ways to obtain tialite by varying the ratio of TiO2: Al2O3 of 45:45, 55:35 and 35:55 molar weight, using 10% molar weight of magnesium oxide as additive. After wet milling for four and eight hours, using high energy milling, the powders were characterized by X-ray diffraction, tialite's formation was not being observed. Tablets were compacted by uniaxial pressing and sintered at 1500oC (2 and 4 hours); X-ray diffraction was used again, which confirmed tialita formation in all compositions. Evaluation of the firing conditions also been identified in all cases the presence of alumina and titanium oxide. Density measurements showed the influence of milling time on the density of the green samples, where density measurements varied from 2.25 g/cm3 for samples with equimolar alumina and titania milled for 4 hours until 2.41 g/cm3 for samples with greater titania content milled for 8 hours. For longer sintering and milling time, it results in lower porosity results, the higher porosity results were related the samples named AT, which showed porosity between 12 and 14%; on the other hand, good results were achieved for samples with greater titania content (5.54% of porosity). The diametrical shrinkage results were really similar for all samples, it were around 10% for the most samples. Mechanical and micro structural characterization of burned samples were also carried out, as well as, the diametrical compression tests and scanning electron microscopy, respectively. Concerning mechanical strength, the results showed the positive effects of milling time, where the, tests showed, the longer the milling time, the greater the resistance encountered in diametric compression, where samples with greater titania content demonstrated the highest resistance, achieved 9.31 MPA, while the samples AT didn’t achieve more than 4.88MPa. The samples with greater titania content also demonstrated more refined microstructure with grain size of 1m.