The increasing use of Aluminum Nitride (AlN) in power electronics, dissipating heat and providing electrical insulation has been an ongoing trend. The performance of Aluminum Nitride far outstrips Alumina in some critical areas. But the added cost of manufacturing AlN...
Cutting it with Fire & Water
Over the years there have been many great movies involving fire and water and the fantasy drama television series ‘Game of Thrones’ has done much to take two of the earth’s most natural elements to a whole new level.
Behind the scenes, fire and water provide a slightly less glamorous […]
Chicken & Egg – A Strange Parallel with Technical Ceramics
Throughout history, philosophers and scientists have confronted the dilemma “which came first, the chicken or the egg”? To ancient philosophers, this problem was at the center of their questions as to how the universe and life on planet earth began. Even more recently, scientists […]
Cutting it Fine with Ceramics – Specialty Blades for Industry and the Home
Ceramic blades are a relatively new product. Developed for processes that originally required round rotating blades where down time to change them was an issue to the production line, the longer run time of ceramic blades improved efficiency.
Ceramic blades in industrial […]
Ceramics Provide Perfect Cover in Ballistic Armor
Over the years, ceramics have found their way into many specialized fields. But ballistic armor has to be one of the strangest.
In the aftermath of World War II, the search to find new methods of reducing casualties became paramount, especially as the increasing development in rifles […]
Ultra High Vacuum – Invaluable To Science & Research
The first time I heard the expression “ultra-high vacuum”, I was sitting in a meeting in the 1970’s, looking at drawings, and was asked if the parts in the drawing complied. Luckily my colleague was on the ball and I did not need to confess that I wasn’t sure what they meant.
Ultra-high vacuum […]
Ceramic Balls – The Answer to an Engineer’s Prayers!
I first came across a ceramic ball race many years ago when I was handed one which had broken into several pieces. The failure of this assembly should have pointed to limitations in the material. But as it came from a Formula One racing car which had been driven by a certain Michael […]
What are Machinable Ceramics?
For most people, ceramics are hard, brittle materials, mostly associated with tiles, bricks, and pottery. These functional and mostly clay-based materials are the most common ceramics in daily use. The more specialist technical ceramics used in extreme environments and demanding […]
ALN Comes of Age
Aluminum Nitride (ALN) has long been regarded as the material of choice when Alumina substrates cannot meet the demands of high thermal conductance for electronics. The vast majority of the world’s production of Aluminum Nitride is consumed in 0.040” and 0.025” thick […]
New USA Representation for Barat
Barat Ceramics, the German specialist ceramic-to-metal seal company has appointed Precision Ceramics to represent them in the USA. The full range of metalized ceramics, active alloy-brazed and brazed ceramic-to-metal seals, glazed and metalized, will be covered. Barat has a […]