The word ceramic comes from the Greek word “keramicos” meaning ‘of pottery’ or ‘for pottery’. Its root word keramos means clay, tile, or pottery.
Ceramic material is made up of inorganic, non-metallic oxide, nitride, or carbide. It is hard, brittle, heat-resistant, and corrosion-resistant. The use of ceramics has been noted since the dawn of civilization and is commonly used for earthenware, porcelain, and brick. Ceramics have a wide variety of applications due to their notable high-temperature capability, hardness, and electrical properties. Ceramics can be glazed and unglazed and can be coated with crystalline substrates to decrease porosity. Ceramics have come to be used in industrial and building products and modern pieces of equipment such as semiconductors.
In usage, ceramics are divided into four broad categories.
Structural
- Used in bricks, pipes, floor, and roof tiles. They are also used in wear applications like mills, mixers, linings of tubes for abrasive slurries, etc., bearings, sealing devices and inserts for cutting of metals, knives paper and textiles, and orthopedic and dental implants.
- Ceramic Tiles
Refractories
- Used in manufacturing units like kiln linings, gas fire radiants, and steel and glass making crucibles. These ceramics can withstand very high temperatures. They are used to line hot surfaces in industrial processes.
Ceramic ornaments
Whitewares
- Whitewares get their name from ceramic ware that turns white, ivory, or gray after firing. Examples are tableware, cookware, wall tiles, pottery products, and sanitary ware. All vitreous whitewares are called porcelains.
- Ceramic Tablewares
Technical
- Ceramics are used in the manufacturing of coatings for jet engine turbine blades, tiles used in the Space Shuttle program, nuclear fuel uranium oxide pellets, disc brakes, and bearings. Ceramics are frequently replacing metals, polymers, and plastics for parts manufacturing.
Porcelain
Ceramics can be classified into three material categories- oxides (like alumina, beryllia, ceria, and zirconia), non-oxides (like carbide, boride, nitride, and silicide), and composite materials (like particulate reinforced, fiber reinforced, combinations of oxides, and non-oxides).
