Kaolin Geopolymer as Precursor to Ceramic Formation

Abstract

This paper introduced the potential application of kaolin geopolymer as ceramic precursor. This is one of the alternatives to produce high strength ceramic at a slightly lower temperature. Upon sintering the conversion of geopolymer to ceramic occur. The kaolin used were characterized using XRF and has plate-like structure upon investigating through microstructural analysis. Geopolymer mixture is produced using 12 M NaOH molarity with the Na₂SiO₃/NaOH ratio of 0.24. The sintering temperature used were ranging from 900 °C to 1200 °C. The flexural strength showed the highest value of 88.47 MPa when sintered at 1200 °C. The combination of geopolymerization and sintering has attributed to the strength increment as temperature increased. The density is observed to increase with increasing sintering temperature due to the appearance of the close pores in the structure. Sintering of the geopolymer resulted in the formation of liquid phase, which enables the joining of particles to produce dense microstructure.