Effect of MnO2 addition on properties of NiFe2O4-based cermets

The impact of MnO2 as an additive on the properties of NiFe2O4-based cermets prepared by the two-steps sintering method has been investigated. The new material was characterized in terms of the crystal structure, microstructure, linear shrinkage, relative density and porosity. Moreover, the bending strength of NiFe2O4-based cermets was measured. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD) shows that the addition of MnO2 has no obvious influence on the crystal structure of the cermets. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) studies reveals that the grain sizes of cermets decreases slightly with doped MnO2. The results show that the linear shrinkage, relative density and bending strength increase at first and then decrease slightly. A high-density (99.56%) and high-strength (84.28 MPa) NiFe2O4-based cermets has been obtained by adding 0.50 wt% MnO2 into the matrix.