A novel test specimen for strength testing of ceramics for additive manufacturing

This paper introduces a new method for strength testing of additively manufactured ceramics, which was designed to take the characteristics of the manufacturing process into account. It was developed for time- and material efficient specimen fabrication and its design allows adjustment so that different surface orientations can be investigated. This gives insight into the influence of surface structures on the measured strength, which vary significantly depending on the surface orientation. Functional expressions for strength evaluation and the determination of effective volume are given and validated through Finite Element Analysis (FEA). The influence of surface structures on the measured strength is analyzed based on Weibull theory and FEA. Other influences on the accuracy of this testing method are discussed and quantified based on practical observations. The manufacturing process, testing setup and statistical evaluation for specimens of three different configurations is outlined and the results and applicability of this method are discussed.