Atmosphere Debinding Heat Treatment of 3D Printed Alumina Ceramics

Debinding heat treatment process play an important role in forming quality of 3D printing ceramics. At present, the alumina green body prepared by light curing 3D printing is sintered after debinding in air. The final alumina ceramics may have defects such as micro cracks, resulting in poor mechanical properties. Direct heating and debinding in air may lead to cracks caused by reaction between resin and oxygen in green body. To avoid this situation, this work studies the printing heat treatment process of alumina ceramics based on digital light processing (DLP) technology. The alumina ceramic green body prepared by 3D printing was degreased either in air or in argon, and their macro morphologies were compared with each other. It is found that there are micro cracks in the alumina green body debinding in air. After being sintered in air, the alumina ceramics was obtained and their micro morphology and macro properties were characterized. Average grain size of alumina ceramics debinding in argon was larger than that directly debinding in air, while the grain structure was dense without obvious pore and impurity. Moreover, in terms of mechanical properties, alumina ceramics debinding in air have higher compressive strength. The highest density of alumina debinding in argon reaches 96.72%, and the compressive strength reaches 761.7 MPa, significantly improved as compared with the one debinding in air.