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A high-strain-rate superplastic ceramic

Nature volume 413, pages 288–291 (2001)Cite this article

Abstract

High-strain-rate superplasticity describes the ability of a material to sustain large plastic deformation in tension at high strain rates of the order of 10-2 to 10-1 s-1 and is of great technological interest for the shape-forming of engineering materials. High-strain-rate superplasticity has been observed in aluminium-based1 and magnesium-based2 alloys. But for ceramic materials, superplastic deformation has been restricted to low strain rates of the order of 10-5 to 10-4 s-1 for most oxides3,4 and nitrides5 with the presence of intergranular cavities leading to premature failure. Here we show that a composite ceramic material consisting of tetragonal zirconium oxide, magnesium aluminate spinel and α-alumina phases exhibits superplasticity at strain rates up to 1 s-1. The composite also exhibits a large tensile elongation, exceeding 1,050 per cent for a strain rate of 0.4 s-1. The tensile flow behaviour and deformed microstructure of the material indicate that superplasticity is due to a combination of limited grain growth in the constitutive phases and the intervention of dislocation-induced plasticity in the zirconium oxide phase. We suggest that the present results hold promise for the application of shape-forming technologies to ceramic materials.

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Figure 1: Scanning electron micrograph of the as-sintered microstructure.
Figure 2: Specimens before and after deformation at 1,650 °C.
Figure 3: Stress–strain curves at 1,650 °C. ε̇0 is the initial strain rate.
Figure 4: Transmission electron micrograph of a ZrO2 grain in a specimen deformed to an elongation of 390% at 1,650 °C and at an initial strain rate of 1 s-1.

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Acknowledgements

We thank N. Sekine for experimental assistance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Institute for Materials Science, 1-2-1 Sengen, Tsukuba, 305-0047, Ibaraki, Japan

    B.-N. Kim, K. Hiraga, K. Morita & Y. Sakka

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  1. B.-N. Kim
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  2. K. Hiraga
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  3. K. Morita
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  4. Y. Sakka
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Correspondence to B.-N. Kim.

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Kim, BN., Hiraga, K., Morita, K. et al. A high-strain-rate superplastic ceramic. Nature 413, 288–291 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1038/35095025

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