TAPE CASTING: AN ENABLING CERAMIC

FABRICATION TECHNOLOGY

Richard E. Mistler
Richard E. Mistler, Inc.
1430 Bristol Pike
Morrisville, PA 19067, USA

According to Webster New Universal Unabridged Dictionary one of the definitions for
the word enabling is as follows: o make possible or effective.” This is a perfect
description for the many uses being made of tape casting as a fabrication technology
today. In this brief article we will review some of the applications which use tape casting
as a tepping stone’ to fabricate the final shape or part, many of which could not be
manufactured by any other processing technique.

The Tape Casting Process: The basic tape casting process and formulations, etc. have
been described in detail in many publications in recent years. (1,2,3) The purpose of this
publication is not to review the process but rather to show its utility as an nabling’ and
very important contributing processing step toward the production of the final product.
However, a few brief words about tapes which make them ideal for processing utility
downstream are in order at this point.

Tape casting is a process which permits the fabrication of thin, essentially two
dimensional parts in the reen’ or un-fired state. These parts can be as thin as 2-3
microns and as thick as 6 mm. Most tapes are in the 0.25 mm to 1.27 mm thickness
range, however. Tapes can be cast to widths which exceed 1 meter, and lengths which
are defined by the time one has to cast (and the amount of slip available!!). Tape cast
reen’ sheets which measure 1.2 meters x 2.4 meters x 0.5 mm have been manufactured
for use in molten carbonate fuel cells. This has enabled the production of large scale fuel
cells for power generation. The fuel cell technology will eventually become one of the
major power sources in the future and it was enabled by tape casting. Therefore, the
ability to manufacture large thin sheets of a wide variety of materials is one of the
important major advantages of the tape casting process.
Another advantage of tape casting is the ability to laminate the unfired tape using heat,
pressure, and dwell time to form a monolithic structure which is comprised of many
layers some of which may be of different base compositions. Lamination, which was
invented by W.J. Gyurk (4), is the basis for the multilayered ceramic capacitor (MLCC)
and multilayered ceramic package (MLC) industries. There are many other new and
exciting structures that use the ability of tapes to be laminated as the foundation for their
structures. the binders used in the tape casting process are thermoplastic therefore they
soften and are very easy to stick together at relatively low temperatures and pressures,
usually less than 100 C and 14 Mpa (2000 psi).

Typical tape casting machines manufactured and sold today include the following
features: A sturdy casting surface, a multi-zoned drying chamber, heated counter-current
air (or other gas) flow, and a uniform and precisely controlled casting speed.

This leads us into a discussion of the first application of tape casting as an enabling
technology: Multilayers and more specifically- Multilayered Ceramic Capacitors or
MLCC .

Multilayered Ceramic Capacitors: It could be said that tape casting was invented by
Glenn Howatt in 1952 (5) to produce multilayered capacitors. If one reads the original
paper, Howatt words were, t was also found possible to combine the firing of the
ceramic pieces and the electrodes. The dry sheets were coated on both sides with a gold-
platinum paste (Hanovia Chemical Co., No. 14) and stacked several squares high. These
were fired successfully into one dense block in a single operation. Units of very large
capacitance in small volumes were made by this method.” (6) Tape casting was actually
developed as a technique for the manufacture of thin layers of dielectric ceramics to
replace natural mica in capacitor devices. The development was necessitated by the
shortages incurred during World War II.

Harold Stetson, in his very descriptive paper (7), detailed the evolution of multilayer
ceramic technology. His own work at RCA, which defined the metal-ceramic co-
sintering process (8), along with the development of the lamination technique by Warren
Gyurk, provided the basic building blocks necessary for this new technology. Today the
limits of tape casting are being pushed to form very thin layers of dielectric materials.
Some tapes are being cast which dry to thicknesses which are less than 3 microns thick.
these tapes are metallized and laminated to form MLCC structures which are 300 layers
thick. The goal of this exercise is to raise the capacitance of the device while reducing
the area consumed on the circuit board. This technology and its > $1 billion (US)
industry could not exist without tape casting as the ackbone’.
Functionally Gradient Materials: Currently there is considerable research being
conducted in both academia and in industry to produce functionally gradient materials
(FGM) for a wide variety of applications. Once again this exciting new processing
technique makes use of tape casting as its basic, enabling, technology. The ability to tape
cast and laminate several layers of materials with differing chemical composition makes
these FGM possible. Two examples of FGMs will be reviewed in the sections which
follow. I am convinced that many other applications will be found for this new
processing technique in the future.

One of the first applications of FGMs was described in a paper written by Sabljic and
Wilkinson (9). In this paper a process was described which utilizes tape casting and
lamination to form a metal/ceramic composite. It is well known that in the processing of
metal/ceramic composites there are often severe problems associated with the significant
differences in coefficients of thermal expansion. Stresses developed between the ceramic
and metallic layers can often cause de-lamination failures. To minimize this differential
at the ceramic/metal interface, functionally gradient materials systems have been
developed. FGMs use a series of thin tape cast layers each with a slightly different
ceramic/metal composition. these layers are then laminated together and after sintering
they form a gradual transition from a ure’ ceramic surface layer to a ure’ metallic
surface layer. Tape casting is the layer forming technique of choice since the same
organics can be used throughout the composite structure. This in turn allows one to use
the same lamination and organic burnout schedules during the final fabrication process.
The composition of the layers as well as the thickness of the layers can be adjusted to
yield the desired compositional gradient.

Another very interesting use of this technology was described in a recent US Patent (10).
The structure described in this patent could actually be called an electronically graded
composite or EGC. The paper describes a laminated structure of ceramic ferroelectric
materials with adjacent layers of barium strontium titanate and other oxides which are
stacked in order of descending oxide content and sized in thickness to produce a
generally equal capacitance across each layer. This results in a material which has a
graded dielectric constant for use in a phased array antenna. The structure and the
resulting product could only be produced by using tape casting as an enabling fabrication
technique.
Rapid Three Dimensional Prototyping: Another exciting new technology that has
been made possible through the use of tape casting is rapid three-dimensional
prototyping. Rapid prototyping (also known as solid freeform fabrication) was originally
introduced by Lone Peak Engineering and Helisys, Inc. in 1992. (11) This technology
depends upon tape casting to form the individual, thin layers which are then cut to shape
by a laser and laminated together to form a three dimensional part. Case Western
Reserve University has implemented such a process and has designated it the CAM-LEM
Process. the thinner each individual layer is in the lay-up the more detailed the final
shape of the three-dimensional object. Rapid prototyping combines computer-aided
design (CAD) with the lamination process to form a final fabricated part. The beauty of
the process is the ability to form very complex parts in a very short turn around time from
the initial design to a finished model.

Zimmer, Inc., Midwest Orthopedics, and the U.S. Department of Energy Argonne
National Laboratory reported one of the very interesting applications for this technology.
(12) These laboratories are developing a processing technique for the rapid production of
joint and bone segment replacements. The claim is that rapid prototyping will permit the
orthopedic surgeon to create a replacement bone segment by directly translating X-Ray
information through a computer program into the ceramic prosthesis. This is a use for
tape casting technology which was never dreamed of by its inventor: Glenn Howatt.

Thin Sheet Intermetallic Compounds: there are many intermetallic compounds, which
have very low ductility at ambient temperatures. These materials are very difficult to
process into thin sheets. by using powder metallurgical techniques and tape casting some
of these materials have been fabricated into continuous thin sheets. These sheets can then
be subjected to a heat treatment cycle to burn out the organics and they can then be
sintered and rolled to full density utilizing a sequence of cold work and annealing. The
use of tape casting as an nabling’ technology to produce iron aluminide (FeAl) thin
sheets has recently been reported. (13) It is felt that this same technology can be used for
other intermetallic compounds, especially if they are needed in the form of thin,
continuous sheets.

Summary: What we have attempted to show through a few specific examples is that
tape casting as a processing technology is indeed an nabling technology’ and that it is
being used to fabricate shapes and materials for a myriad of applications. The
imagination of design engineers in the future will undoubtedly lead to new and exciting
applications for this technology.
 References

1. R.E. Mistler, D.J. Shanefield, and R.B. Runk, ape Casting of Ceramics,” in Ceramic
Processing Before Firing, G.Y. Onoda, Jr. and L.L. Hench, eds., John Wiley and Sons,
New York, 1978, pp. 411-448.

2. R.E. Mistler, ape Casting,” in Engineering Materials Handbook, Volume 4,

Ceramics and Glasses, ASM International, 1991, pp. 161 - 165.

3. R.E. Mistler and Eric R. Twiname, Tape Casting: Theory and Practice, The American
Ceramic Society, Westerville, OH, 2000.

4. W.J. Gyurk, ethods for Manufacturing Monolithic Ceramic Bodies,” U.S. Patent
3,192,086 (June 29, 1965).

5. G.N. Howatt, ethod of Producing High Dielectric High Insulation Ceramic Plates,”
U.S. Patent 2,582,993 (January 22, 1952).

6. G.N. Howatt, R.G. Breckenridge, and J.M. Brownlow, abrication of Thin Ceramic
Sheets for Capacitors,” J. Amer. Ceram. Soc., 30 (8) 237-42 (1947).

7. H.W. Stetson, ultilayer Ceramic Technology,” in Ceramics and Civilization, Vol.III,

High Technology Ceramics-Past, Present, and Future, W.D. Kingery and E. Lense, eds.,
The American Ceramic Society, Westerville, OH, 1986, pp. 307 -22.

8. H.W. Stetson, ethod of Making Multilayer Circuits,” U.S. Patent 3,189,978 (June
22, 1965).

9. D.B. Sabljic and D.S. Wilkenson, abrication of Ni-NiO Composites by Tape

casting,” Industrial Heating, 85 - 87, (September, 1996).

10. L.C. Sengupta, E. Ngo, M.E. O ay, S. Stowell, R. Laneto, S. Sengupta, et. al.,
lectronically Graded Multilayer Ferroelectric Composites,” U.S. Patent 5,693,429
(December 2, 1997).

11. one Peak Engineering Wins Ceramic LOM Process Award,” Press Release, Lone
Peak Engineering, Inc., September 15, 1992.

12. J.D. Cawley and Z. Liu, pplying Tape Casting to Layered Manufacturing
Processes,” Ceramic Industry, 148 (3) 42-8 (1998).

13. eramic Bones Made to Order,” Industry Week, 246, 67 (January 20, 1997).
14. R.E. Mistler, V.K. Sikka, C.R. Scorey, J.E. McKernan, and M.R. Hajaligol, ape
Casting as a Fabrication Process for Iron Aluminide (FeAl) Thin Sheets,” in Materials
Science and Engineering, Vol. A258, Iron Aluminides: Alloy Design, Processing,
Properties and Applications, S.C. Deevi, D.G. Morris, J.H. Schneibel, and V.K. Sikka,
eds., Elsevier, New York, 1998, pp. 258 -65.