Advanced ceramic pastes, based on precursor of aluminium titanate (tialite, Al2TiO5), were prepared in two steps by ball milling starting from an aqueous slurry and with the addition of a thickener. Rheological behaviour of the prepared slurries and pastes with different formulations were analysed up to identify a tialite based paste with shear thinning behaviour and yield stress value suitable to be 3D printed by Liquid Deposition Modeling (LDM). In particular, printable pastes with a solid content up to 51 vol% were prepared. Shaping of aluminium titanate green bodies was realized both by LDM and conventional pressing to compare the properties of the sintered materials. Both shaping processes lead to a porous tialite with density value of 67.6 ± 0.7% for 3D printed tialite and of 75.6 ± 0.1% for pressed tialite. Furthermore, the morphology and thermogravimetric analysis of ceramic powder before and after ball milling were performed. Physico-chemical, microstructure and thermomechanical characterization of the obtained sintered material demonstrated that the LDM technique can be used to manufacture tialite starting from a suitable formulation of the ceramic paste. Moreover, the thermomechanical tests confirmed higher mechanical strength for pressed tialite; after a thermal shock treatment at 400 °C both 3D printed and pressed tialite shown a moderate decrease of mechanical properties. © 2022

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