Engineering

Fabrication

Materials science

Coating

Ceramic

Green body

Solvent

Dispersant

Industrial and production engineering

Mechanical engineering

Alternative medicine

Physics

Organic chemistry

Optics

Gloss (optics)

Slurry

Process engineering

Composite material

Sintering

Dispersion (optics)

Medicine

Chemistry

Cubic zirconia

Stereolithography

Glaze

Flexural strength

Pathology

The International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing Technology

This paper describes an efficient method of fabricating high-performance ceramic (HPC) parts by using solvent-based slurry stereolithography (3S) and sintering. In this study, zirconia was used as the structural material, methyl alcohol was used as the solvent, a waterborne inorganic pigment was used as the dispersant, and a visible-light-curing resin was used as the organic binder for forming the slurry. The slurry was photocured using a visible-light projector for layer-by-layer deposition in an enclosed cabinet to form a three-dimensional object. The obtained green part was sintered at high temperatures (up to 1600 °C) so that it densified and formed a rigid body. Thus, an HPC part with high material strength could be produced. A complete system was developed for producing complex zirconia ceramic parts with a high level of precision without the necessity of generating support structures for the overhang features. The system was determined to achieve a very fine-detailed shape (30 μm). The mechanical properties of the obtained zirconia parts, such as flexural strength, density, and average roughness, were also investigated in this study.

Fabrication of zirconia ceramic parts by using solvent-based slurry stereolithography and sintering