Abstract

In this study, the co- precipitation method and annealing process were used to prepare the yttria stabilized zirconia ceramics. Data of Raman and XRD showed that an increase of yttria doping leads to an decrease of the ratio between monoclinic and tetragonal phases. Howerver, it existed a critical concentration of yttrium at which the highest value of hardness was about 14.5 GPa and grain sizes of 0.2–0.5 m. An investigation of low temperature degradation indicated that theaging process only occurred in the first 5 hours and then virtually negligible changes.