Microstructure and properties of PZT53/47 thick films derived from sols with submicron-sized PZT particle

A hybrid sol–gel process technology has been developed for the fabrication of thick films of lead zirconate titanate (PZT) thick films. In this paper, submicron-sized PZT powder was dispersed into a 2-methoxyethanol (MOE) diluted PZT sol solution uniformly to obtain a suspension/slurry for spin-coating purpose. Thick films on platinized silicon substrate with thickness of 10 μm were obtained after annealing at 650 °C for 30 min. A higher sol solution concentration had larger single layer thickness, but a smaller one resulted in a more uniform surface. The resultant films have a composite microstructure. Dielectric and ferroelectric properties were investigated for all samples made from such process. Ferroelectric P–E hysteresis loop were obtained for most of them and the dielectric constant, remanent polarization, and coercive field for sample 3023 were 884, 20 μC/cm2, and 95 kV/cm, which was comparable with bulk PZT ceramic.