William Newell Schultz

Microwave Sintering of ZnO Varistor Ceramics

ZnO varistors are electronic ceramics whose electrical behavior is dominated by grain boundary effects. A careful evaluation of the effect of microwave sintering compared to conventional sintering revealed no significant differences between varistor devices processed by these two methods. A slight apparent enhancement of grain growth was observed for microwave processing, but further evaluation of this effect leads us to believe that it arises from a small systematic shift in temperature derived from the different experimental configurations.