High electrical properties of W-additive Mn-modified PZT–PMS–PZN ceramics for high power piezoelectric transformers

The ceramics were prepared successfully by the addition of WO3 to the Mn-modified Pb(Zr0.52Ti0.48)O3–Pb(Mn1/3Sb2/3)O3–Pb(Zn1/3Nb2/3)O3 (PZT–PMS–PZN) for high power piezoelectric transformers application. XRD analysis indicated that the ceramics were mainly composed of a tetragonal phase in the range of 0–1.0 wt.% WO3 addition. The grain size of the ceramics significantly decreased from 10.0 to 2.9 μm by addition of WO3. Moreover, the addition of WO3 promoted densification of the ceramics and increased mechanical quality factor (Qm), planar coupling factor (Kp) and piezoelectric constant (d33) kept high values, whereas, dielectric loss (tan δ) was low. Δf (=fa − fr) slightly changed when WO3 addition was above 0.5 wt.%. The ceramics with 0.6 wt.% WO3 addition, sintered at 1150 °C showed the optimized piezoelectric and dielectric properties with Qm of 1852, Kp of 0.58, d33 of 243 pC/N and tan δ of 0.0050. The ceramics are promising candidates for high power piezoelectric transformers application.