SYNTHESIS OF NANO-ZnO PARTICLES FOR ALUMINUM METALLURGY AS INERT ANODE MATERIAL

Nano-ZnO particle was produced by evaporating zinc powders in air at air flow-rate from 0.2 to 0.6m3/h. Nano-ZnO particles was formed by the oxidation of the evaporated zinc vapor. X-ray diffraction shows the powders to be ZnO with lattice parameters of a=0.3249nm and c=0.5205nm. The particle size is dependent upon the transit time from the source to the collection area. The size of particles was ranged between 81 to 103nm. The average density resulted was 4.865g/cm3.Normal ZnO and nano-ZnO were investigated to use them in aluminum metallurgy as an inert anode material. A certain amount of both oxides were molded subsequently inserted to the molten cryolite-aluminum oxide to investigate the corrosive behavior of both oxides. When the sintering temperature increased up to 1300 ℃, the weight loss ratio rose to 5.01%-7.33% and up to 7.67%-10.18% for nano-ZnO and normal ZnO, respectively. However, when the samples in the molten cryolite aluminum oxide were put for long time, the corrosive rate was found to be higher. It was found that the corrosive loss weight ratio of nano-ZnO anode was much lower than the normal one made from ordinary-ZnO providing that the nano-ZnO is more possible to be use inert anode material.