High temperature creep behaviour of ceramics

The improvement in high temperature mechanical properties of silicon nitride ceramics has been explored by fabrication of a β′-Si 3 N 4 α-YSiAlON ceramic densified, without additives and without HIP treatment, by sintering of a mixture of α-Si3N4 and α- YSiAlON powders under a nitrogen pressure of 5 MPa. The high temperature creep behaviour was investigated in the ranges 100–400 MPa and 1280–1400 ° C by compressive tests. The creep performances were very impressive. The activation energy (Q = 770 kJ/mol) and the stress exponent (n = 1) are consistent with a deformation mechanism resulting from grain boundary sliding accommodated by volume diffusion. Microstructure was not affected by the deformation conditions, in particular no cavity formation was observed after creep at 1400 °C and 300 MPa. This behaviour is related to the probable absence of a thick boundary film which may result from crystallization during cooling of small glass pockets and from internal stresses caused by the volume change of crystallizing pockets.