Model for the cold sintering of lead zirconate titanate ceramic composites

A model was developed to describe the cold sintering process (CSP) of lead zirconate titanate (PZT) using moistened lead nitrate as a sintering aid. The densities of PZT powder with different volume fractions of lead nitrate were evaluated after cold sintering at 300°C and 500 MPa for 3 hours. The densities were categorized into three zones. In zone I, the relative density following cold sintering increases from 66% to 80%, as the lead nitrate contents rise from 0 to 14 vol%. In this case, the lead nitrate acts to fill some of the pore volume between PZT grains. Zone II serves as a transition region, where there is both pore filling and dilution of the PZT grains associated with lead nitrate contents from 14 to 34 vol%. In zone III, the relative density drops due to dilution at lead nitrate contents exceeding 34 vol%. To slow the process down so that the kinetics could be studied more readily, samples were cold sintered at room-temperature and 500 MPa. It was found that during the first few seconds of compaction, 85PZT/15Pb(NO₃)₂ rapidly densified from 51% to 61% relative density due to particle re-arrangement. For longer times at pressure, the CSP improved the packing relative to PZT compacted without the lead nitrate, yielding a higher relative density. The late stages of the PZT/Pb(NO₃)₂ CSP could be well described using a viscous sintering model for pressures from 50 MPa to 1000 MPa and temperatures from 25°C to 300°C.