Formulation of monoporosa fritts aiming the optimization of the behaviour of ceramic tiles glazes

• Grant number: 06/06123-3
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: May 01, 2007
• End date: April 30, 2009
• Field of knowledge: Engineering - Materials and Metallurgical Engineering - Nonmetallic Materials
• Principal Investigator: Anselmo Ortega Boschi
• Grantee: Anselmo Ortega Boschi
• Host Institution: Centro de Ciências Exatas e de Tecnologia (CCET). Universidade Federal de São Carlos (UFSCAR). São Carlos , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The sector of frits and glazes manufacturers is of great importance for the ceramic tile industry. Thus, the present work is aimed to discern the influence of the chemical composition of the monoporous ceramic frits on the behavior of the devised glazes, and to afford knowledge to the rational design of frits with the performance required for the modern manufacturing process of ceramic tiles.Nowadays, the glazes used in the Brazilian ceramic tiles industry are mainly constituted by monoporous ceramic frits. The main characteristics of monoporous ceramic frits are high softening temperature and low high temperature viscosity. These characteristics facilitate the removal of gases coming forth from the substrate during the fast single firing process and permit the formation of highly bright and smooth enamel layers, perfectly coupled to the ceramic substrate. The study will consist of to main stages. In the first one a statistical experimental design will be carried out, with the contents of oxides in the frits (mainly SiO2, Al2O3, B2O3, CaO, ZnO and K2O) as the independent factors. The response factors to be measured will be the rheological properties of the frit slurry, and brightness, roughness, transparency, thermal expansion and fusibility of the resulting glazes. In the second stage, the effect of raw materials used as a source of oxides, as well as the particle size distribution of the monoporous ceramic frits, will be studied for one fixed chemical composition selected on the base of the results of the previous stage.The interpretation of the results will allow to understand the importance of each oxide on the frits behavior, as well as to identify the composition intervals where an optimum behavior of frits in the manufacturing process of ceramics tiles is obtained. (AU)