Power‐controlled flash spark plasma sintering of gadolinia‐doped ceria

Flash spark plasma sintering (FSPS) is a newly developed technique for consolidation of powder materials into dense compacts. This method belongs to the group of electrical field-assisted sintering (FAST) techniques. It combines the voltage/current characteristics of flash sintering (FS),1,2 usually performed in pressure-less dog-bone configuration, with the sintering cell design typical of spark plasma sintering (SPS).3 Recent investigations in FSPS4-8 use mostly a modification of the classical SPS to achieve FS conditions. This is usually done through the insertion of a nonconductive sleeve (eg, BN9) between the powder (or pre-compacted/partially pre-sintered pellet) and the graphite die, or alternatively in a die-free configuration. Commercial instruments enabling FSPS processing with higher voltage characteristics (>10 V), using independent external heating of the die or precise time application of the electric field, are under development or in early application stage. In the presented paper, we describe the pressure-assisted FS compaction of powder in an SPS configuration using such a newly developed instrument. We have chosen ceria as a sintering probe not only for its Received: 23 June 2020 | Revised: 12 August 2020 | Accepted: 5 September 2020 DOI: 10.1111/jace.17510

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