Phase coexistence and high piezoelectric properties in (K0.40Na0.60)0.96Li0.04Nb0.80Ta0.20O3 ceramics

Lead-free (KxNa1-x)0.96Li0.04 Nb0.80Ta0.20O3 ceramics with x = 0.10-0.70 were prepared by the conventional solid-state reaction technique. The influence of the K/Na ratio on the microstructure, crystallographic structure, phase transition and piezoelectric properties was investigated. It has been disclosed that the phase transition temperature TO-T drastically decreases with x in the narrow compositional range of x 0.30-0.40 and the phase coexistence of the orthorhombic structure and the tetragonal structure occurs near x = 0.40. The ceramics with x = 0.40 shows high piezoelectric properties (d33 = 254 pC N-1, kp = 51.5%, kt = 49.4% and k33 = 66.6%, respectively) with low dielectric loss (tan δ 1.5%) and weak temperature dependence between 10 and 85 deg. C. In particular, the piezoelectric properties remain almost unchanged in the thermal ageing test from -125 to 300 deg. C. Therefore, this ceramic is considered to be a very promising lead-free piezoelectric material for practical applications. The relation of piezoelectric properties with morphotropic phase boundary and polymorphic phase transition was discussed