Sintering

Sintering is a method for making strong ceramic objects from ceramic powder.

• Mixing water, binder, antiflocculant, and ceramic powder to form a slurry.
• Spray drying the slurry
• Putting the spray dryed powder into a mold and pressing it to form a green body (An unsintered ceramic material)
• Heating the Green Body at low temperature to burn the binder off.
• Sintering at a high temperature to fuse the ceramic particles together.

A similar process of sintering is sometimes used to form metallic objects. Sintered bronze in particular is frequently used as a material for bearings since it is porous and thus allows lubricants to flow through.

Sintering is related to Diffusion.