Aa. Wereszczak et al., ROLE OF OXIDATION IN THE TIME-DEPENDENT FAILURE BEHAVIOR OF HOT ISOSTATICALLY PRESSED SILICON-NITRIDE AT 1370-DEGREES-C, Journal of the American Ceramic Society, 76(11), 1993, pp. 2919-2922
Dynamic fatigue studies were conducted on a hot isostatically pressed
silicon nitride in ambient air and inert (argon or nitrogen) environme
nts using four-point flexure at 1370-degrees-C. Specimens tested in am
bient air exhibited a stressing rate dependence with decreased flexure
strength with decreased stressing rates. All fracture surfaces of spe
cimens tested in ambient air possessed a sweeping stress-oxidation dam
age zone that originated at the tensile side of each bend bar. In addi
tion to this stress-oxidation damage, creep damage (e.g., cavitation)
was concurrently observed in the specimens tested at the slower stress
ing rates, which appeared to further weaken the material. However, tes
ts conducted in argon or nitrogen revealed flexure strength to be inde
pendent of the stressing rate. Creep damage was present at the slower
stressing rates, but no stress-oxidation damage was evident similar to
that observed on the specimens tested in ambient air. By decoupling t
he effects of oxidation and creep, it was evident that the former cont
ributed to the formation of a detrimental stress-oxidation damage zone
which significantly reduced the strength of this material at 1370-deg
rees-C.