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Corrosion of Ceramics in Aqueous Hydrofluoric Acid
Author(s) -
Mikeska Kurt R.,
Bennison Stephen J.,
Grise Steven L.
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
journal of the american ceramic society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.9
H-Index - 196
eISSN - 1551-2916
pISSN - 0002-7820
DOI - 10.1111/j.1151-2916.2000.tb01348.x
Subject(s) - hydrofluoric acid , corrosion , materials science , dissolution , crystallite , ceramic , grain boundary , carbide , aqueous solution , microstructure , metallurgy , nitride , oxide , mineralogy , chemical engineering , composite material , chemistry , layer (electronics) , engineering
A variety of commercially available ceramic‐based oxides, carbides, nitrides, and borides were evaluated for chemical attack in an azeotropic aqueous hydrofluoric acid (HF) test protocol at 90°C. Weight change measurements and microstructure analysis showed that HF corrosion in polycrystalline ceramics generally occurred at grain boundaries by the dissolution of grain boundary phases although the bulk single crystal may inherently resist attack. Virtually all commercially prepared polycrystalline oxide ceramics (i.e., Al 2 O 3 , TiO 2 , ZrO 2 ) and nonoxide ceramics (i.e., Si 3 N 4 , AlN, BN) were extensively corroded while polycrystalline pure carbides (i.e., SiC, TiC, B 4 C, WC) resisted corrosion. Equilibrium thermodynamic calculations show that these materials are soluble in HF; however, the kinetics of dissolution are slow enough in some cases to permit useful engineering lifetimes.