Method of forming ceramic bodies

US4441905A · kind A · utility

Assignee

• Corning Glass Works · US

Inventors

• Joseph W. Malmendier · Corning, US
• Carol F. Pride · Big Flats, US
• Randy Lee Rhoads · Horseheads, US
• Robert J. Schlaufman · Elmira, US
• Robert D. Shoup · Penn Yan, US

Key dates

• Filing date: Jan 27, 1983
• Grant date: Apr 10, 1984
• Expiry date: Jan 27, 2003

Classification

• Technology area (CPC Y): Emerging Cross-Sectional Technologies
• CPC primary: Y10T428/2996
• WIPO field: Materials, metallurgy
• WIPO sector: Chemistry

Abstract

A method is disclosed for producing low density, ceramic bodies in the nature of hollow or solid beads which may be used as such or bonded into a unitary mass. The bodies are composed of ion-exchanged, synthetic mica crystals wherein large cations, such as K.sup.+, have been exchanged for lithium and/or sodium ions from the mica. The method involves forming a gel by dissolution of a synthetic mica in a polar liquid, releasing droplets of the gel into a fluid to form shaped bodies, effecting the indicated ion exchange, and drying the beads thus formed.