All About Ceramic Materials

You are most likely familiar with the term 'ceramics' but this class of material goes beyond pottery. In fact, ceramics are widely used to make components in the aerospace industry thanks to their many benefits. These include durability, strength, hardness, wear resistance, and electrical and thermal insulation. They also offer chemical stability.

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Read on to find out more about exactly what ceramics are, the different types available, their properties, and how they're being used in aerospace and 3D printing. 

What Are Ceramics?

The term, 'ceramic materials,' is a wide-ranging category largely defined by a lack of organic substances (those based around carbon-hydrogen bonds) and metallic elements. Absent those components, ceramics may be composed of: clay, minerals, oxides, and other compounds. Ceramics are basically what is left over after organic and metallic materials have been removed. Common ceramics are tiles, bricks, plates, glass, and toilets. 

Ceramics are a refractory material, which means they are durable and able to withstand high temperatures. They also resist high pressures and most chemical compounds and are generally poor electrical conductors. Most ceramics are non-magnetic. Some ceramics shatter easily, while others are very tough. 

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There are two ceramic categories'traditional and modern. Traditional ceramics are things like pottery, and modern ceramics are a more advanced material category that are specially engineered to have specific properties. Many, for example, are meant to be hard and durable. Ceramics are typically shaped at moderate temperatures and then heated or 'fired' at high temperatures to create hard, durable materials that resist heat, wear, and corrosion. The material is considered to be ceramic once it is no longer soluble in water even if heated. 

It is important here to differentiate between water solubility and porosity. Some ceramics are still porous, meaning that they will still absorb water, but they are not water-soluble. Ceramics can be found in a wide variety of products and applications including tiles, bricks, engineering ceramics used in electronic devices, and aerospace components. We'll talk a bit more about the two different ceramic types a little further down.

The starting materials are soft and malleable, meaning they can be shaped. Clay is an example of a starting material.

These soft materials are shaped and then heated to make harder materials which we call ceramics.

These new hard ceramic materials have a fixed shape and cannot be bent.

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