Surface resistivity regulation of zirconia ceramics for anti-static purposes by novel solution infiltration method

An innovative processing method for regulating the surface resistivity of zirconia ceramic has been developed based on solution infiltration in porous preform body. In this study, effects of infiltration solution concentration on the surface resistivity and Vickers hardness were investigated. It was shown that the surface resistivity decreased with the increase of infiltration concentration, while the surface hardness was not significantly influenced. For a typical sample infiltrated in 3 mol/L Fe(NO3)3·9H2O solution for 2 h, the surface resistivity is reduced to 104Ω/□, while the Vickers hardness was kept at 13 GPa. The content of element Fe decreased gradually from the surface to the core of the samples. The status of element Fe was verified as FeO and Fe2O3. About 49.4% of the element Fe was in the status of FeO, which was the conductive composition for anti-static purpose.