Net-Shape Clay Ceramics with Glass Waste Additive

Abstract : In this paper, a glass powder from waste containers was mixed (10 - 40 wt.%) with a kaolinitic sandy clay from Cameroon to elaborate net-shape ceramics, fired at 1100°C. The sintering behavior was from dilatometry and thermo gravimetric analyses together with the characterization of porosity and flexural strength. The increase of glass to kaolinite ratio reduces the sintering shrinkage leading to a none-densification sintering when 40 wt.% of glass is added in the mixture. The volume variation during the whole firing process is from the individual volume variations during the quartz transformation, the structural reorganization of kaolinite and during sintering. Quartz size and relative quantity have a significant role on the first processes since it leads to either cohesive or un-cohesive behavior. But the glass quantity strongly controls the second and the third thermal processes because glass additions change the recrystallization processes, leading to the formation of dense clay-glass agglomerates distributed within the three dimensional quartz network.