Crushing behaviour of cellular cordierite foams

Fernando Costa; Susana Dias; Maria de Fátima Reis Vaz; J Cruz Fernandes; Fernando de Almeida Costa

Key information

Authors:

Fernando Costa (Fernando Costa Oliveira); Susana Dias; Maria de Fátima Reis Vaz (Maria de Fátima Reis Vaz); J Cruz Fernandes (José Jorge Lopes da Cruz Fernandes); Fernando de Almeida Costa (Fernando de Almeida Costa Oliveira)

Published in

February 2004

Abstract

The compressive behaviour of cordierite foams fabricated by the polymer foam replication process was studied at room temperature using a compliant polymeric layer (2 mm thickness PVC) to assist in uniformly loading these brittle foams. Image analysis was used to characterise the microstructure of the samples and provided a basis for evaluating the compressive behaviour of the foams. The cordierite foams were found to exhibit the classical three region characteristic stress-strain behaviour of brittle foams and typical compressive strength ultimate values for isotropic open cellular foams (2-7 MPa). These foams appeared to fail by a damage accumulation process rather than by catastrophic collapse of a bard of cells perpendicular to the loading direction. Evidence suggests that there seems to be a close relationship between the crushing strength of the bulk foam and the microstructure of these ceramic foams.