Effects of particle size on the piezoelectric properties of 0-3 PZT/cement composites

0-3 PZT/cement composites are kinds of new piezoelectric materials which are expected to find application in civil engineering for their high piezoelectric properties and good compatibility with concrete structures. In this study, the effect of particle size on the piezoelectric and dielectric properties of cement based 0-3 piezoelectric composites was investigated. The piezoelectric composites were prepared by mixing and pressing the white cement and PZT powder with different average particle size ranging from 3 mu m to 482 mu m. It was found that the piezoelectric strain factor (d(33)) dielectric constant (epsilon(tau)), and electromechanical coupling coefficient (K-t) increased with the increase of the PZT particle size. However, the composites with larger PZT particles had higher dielectric loss (tan delta) than the composites with smaller particles.