Abstract
An alternative chemical solution processing version of thick and crack free PZT films was developed. PZT films were equally deposited from pure sol and composite suspension on ITO-coated corning glass substrates by dip-coating process and were sintered at various temperatures. The PZT composite sol–gel suspension/slurry was optimized to dip-coating to form thick films with nearly constant thickness and limited cracking. The XRD spectra indicate that the 0–3 ceramic/ceramic composites films possess single-phase perovskite type. SEM micrographs of thick film cross-sections displayed composite structures with no observable boundary between layers. The optimized PZT layer revealed a capacitance resultant to a permitivity of Ɛr = 1282 and tang(δ) = 0.17 at 100 Hz. The remnant polarization, and coercive field for the same sample estimated from the ferroelectric P–E hysteresis loop were 30 μC cm−2, and 17 kV cm−1, respectively. The ferroelectric and dielectric constant values were equivalent to those reported for bulk material.
•A sol–gel route using submicron-sized powder coupled with pure sol-gel solution has been established.•The XRD showed that the PZT films exhibit a random crystalline perovskite phase.•The SEM revealed that the added submicron-powder particles were tightly surrounded by the sol–matrix phase.•The calcination temperature and the weight % of the powder to precursor sol in the slurry were critical factors.•The best ferroelectric and dielectric characteristics were measured for the sample prepared with 30 wt.% of PZT powder that was calcined at 900°C.