Electronically conductive porous TiN ceramics with enhanced strength by aqueous gel-casting

In this paper, we report on a study of electronically conductive porous TiN ceramics prepared by aqueous gel-casting. The effects of solid loading, sintering temperature, and sintering aids on the phase composition, microstructure, and volume fraction of porosity of the prepared porous TiN ceramics are studied. The SEM results show that porosity is uniformly distributed in all of the samples studied. With increasing solid loading and sintering temperature, the volume fraction of porosity decreases slowly. Moreover, the relationship between volume fraction of porosity and mechanical and electrical properties has also been investigated. Our results show that adding Y 2 O 3 -TiO 2 as combined sintering aids results in a sharp decrease in the volume fraction of porosity, and the volume fraction range changes from 42%-60% to 28%-52%. Moreover, adding sintering aids results in an increase in flexural strength and electrical conductivity with a change in maximum value from 34.6 MPa and 2.3 × 10 4 S∙m −1 to 101.6 MPa and 5.1 × 10 4 S∙m −1 , respectively.