Templated grain growth and piezoelectric properties of 〈001〉-textured PIN–PMN–PT ceramics

The 〈001〉-textured 36Pb(In1/2Nb1/2)O3–30Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O3–34PbTiO3(36PIN–30PMN–34PT) ceramics were successfully prepared by the templated grain growth method using BaTiO3(BT) templates with an average edge length of 10 µm and a thickness of about 0.5 µm. The highest Lotgering factor of 95% has been achieved for the textured ceramics with 5 wt% BT templates sintered at 1240 °C. The Curie temperature (TC) and dielectric constant (εr) of the textured 36PIN–30PMN–34PT ceramics were 225 °C and 2850, respectively. The piezoelectric constantd33of the textured samples was 780 pC/N and almost 2 times higher than that of random 36PIN–30PMN–34PT samples. The planar mode electromechanical coupling coefficientkpwas 59% for the textured samples. Unipolar strain-field measurements for the textured ceramics exhibited 0.34% strain at 4 kV/mm.