Investigations on laser sintering of ceramic slurries

For almost two decades, layer manufacturing techniques have assisted the product development at various stages from the operational point of view. Laser sintering is a powder-based layer manufacturing technology. Since the beginning of the 1990s, laser sintering of ceramic materials has been investigated academically. Since laser sintered bodies are porous correlating with a comparatively low strength, industrial use is still limited. This paper provides a knowledge base for laser sintering of ceramic suspensions. Therefore a model based on system analysis is generated, which is sub-divided into a drying and a process model. Furthermore experimental investigations with different high-performance oxide ceramic slurries (e.g., zirconia) are conducted in order to approve the estimations of the model.