The ENITEC joint research project focused on making the production of technical ceramics more efficient and thereby reducing energy consumption throughout the entire process chain by up to 40 percent. Heat treatment is one of the most energy-intensive steps in the mass production of ceramics – but BCE was hardly able to achieve any significant savings here due to the purely electrically heated, rather small-volume ovens.
The focus of the BCE work packages was therefore on the development and optimization of the entire process chain, from pressing to (green) processing through to debinding and sintering processes. Thanks to new findings in the simulation of thermal processes, the accuracy of the sintered component has been increased enormously, which has partially eliminated the grinding process that was originally unavoidable. In special cases, this also leads to energy savings, as entire processing steps (hard processing) are no longer necessary. Together with the project partners involved, BCE Special Ceramics GmbH was also able to significantly reduce energy consumption in the production of technical ceramics, including in prototype and small series production, by using new manufacturing concepts.
