Reaction Bonded Composite Foams

Conventional ceramic foams suffer from weak thermo‐mechanical properties. Therefore, the authors developed reaction bonded composite foams. These materials are characterized by high mechanical strength due to their fine grained microstructure. By a right choice of the composition, high thermal shock properties can also be obtained. Firstly mullite with additions of ZrO₂ is considered. Depending on the structural requirements of the application, a certain processing route can be chosen: the polyurethane sponge technique, gel casting or the hollow sphere method. In this contribution, the current state of this study, indicating that this Reaction Bonded manufacturing route is a feasible method for manufacturing composite ceramic foams is discussed.