Fabrication of a lead-free BNT piezoelectric material using a hybrid sintering process

Abstract

In this study, a hybrid sintering process, which is a combination of microwave heating and hot-press, was applied to the fabrication of lead-free piezoelectric materials for the purpose of improving their performance, since the hybrid sintering process was found to be able to improve the density and consequently the piezoelectric properties of PZT and PNN-PZT materials in the former study. The lead-free piezoelectric material used in this study is BNT [(Bi _{1/2} Na _{1/2} ) TiO _3 +0.1wt%MnO _2 ]. The BNT was sintered with the hybrid process, the conventional process, the microwave process and a hot-press process and their piezoelectric properties were investigated and compared.