Your drawing says what. Your operating conditions say how.
Alumina, zirconia, aluminum nitride, silicon nitride, silicon carbide – we machine them all. But we do not choose the material until we know your temperature profile, atmosphere, load cycle, and failure history. Engineering decisions, not catalog picking.
We have replaced metal parts that failed in weeks with ceramics that lasted years. We have also talked customers out of ceramics when the application did not call for them. If the part runs hot, sees wear, or cycles thermally, we want to look at it.
Alumina – the workhorse that needs to last longer than 6 months
Your furnace runs at 1550°C. The alumina tube you bought last quarter is already showing creep. You checked the purity cert – 99%, but it still deformed. Why? Because purity alone doesn’t determine performance. The grain structure and sintering cycle matter just as much.
We take your drawing and your operating conditions – temperature, load, atmosphere, cycle frequency – and recommend not just the purity (95%, 99%, or 99.7%), but also the forming method. Pressed parts behave differently from isostatically pressed ones. Different forming methods yield different grain orientation and density, which directly affect creep resistance and thermal shock behavior. For features under ±0.01mm, we specify which surfaces need post-sinter grinding and which can stay as-fired, so you are not paying for unnecessary machining.
Also used for: electrical insulation in high-voltage assemblies, vacuum chamber feedthroughs, plasma spray masks, and thermocouple protection sheaths. If your application involves heat, voltage, or wear, we have probably built an alumina part for it.
Before we quote, we ask for your actual furnace profile, not just the peak temperature, but the ramp rate and hold time. That data determines the grade and the process. Without it, we are guessing. And we do not guess on parts that run at 1600°C.
Zirconia – when the ceramic keeps breaking on impact
Alumina’s fracture toughness is 3–5 MPa·m¹/². Y‑TZP zirconia runs at 7-10. That difference, roughly double, is what separates a valve seat that shatters on the first impact from one that survives 50,000 cycles. Phase‑transformation toughening is the mechanism, but what matters to you is fewer line stoppages.
We engineer zirconia components – Y‑TZP for impact and wear resistance, Mg‑PSZ for molten metal exposure, Ca‑PSZ for thermal cycling. Your drawing gives us the geometry. Your application tells us which of these three zirconia grades fits. For Y‑TZP, grain size control during sintering is critical – too coarse and you lose toughness; too fine and you lose wear resistance. We hold the sintering window to ±10°C to keep the grain structure in the right range.
Also used for: fiber optic ferrule sleeves (the ones that need sub‑micron finish), pump pistons handling abrasive slurries, mechanical seal faces running dry during start‑up, and guide pins in high‑frequency indexing machinery. Zirconia is the solution when the assembly sees impact or vibration that would crack other ceramics.
If you are replacing a failed Y‑TZP part, send us the failed piece or a photo of the fracture surface. The crack pattern tells us whether it was over‑stressed or under‑toughened. We can often diagnose the failure mode and recommend a processing change before we quote.
Aluminum Nitride – the heat that has nowhere to go
Your power module keeps failing at the solder joint. You replaced the alumina substrate with a higher grade, no improvement. The problem is not purity. The problem is thermal conductivity. Alumina runs at 30 W/m·K. AlN runs at 170–230. That is not an incremental improvement; it is a different thermal management regime.
AlN also matches silicon’s CTE at 4.6 × 10⁻⁶/K, so the substrate expands and contracts with the die, not against it. That means fewer solder joint fatigue failures in thermal cycling. For high‑power LED packages, RF modules, and semiconductor chucks, the hole pattern, via placement, and surface finish are as critical as the material choice. We machine AlN to your layout – ground flat to <0.002mm if you are bonding directly, or as‑sintered with standard tolerances if you are using a thermal interface layer.
Also used for: heater chucks in CVD chambers, heat spreaders for IGBT modules, and substrate carriers in pick‑and‑place equipment that cycles between hot and cold stations. If the application involves power density over 200W/cm², we usually recommend AlN before we look at anything else.
We need to know your die attachment method and the maximum junction temperature before we recommend surface finish and flatness. Direct die‑attach requires different flatness than solder‑reflow assembly. We will ask and adjust the quote accordingly, because over‑specifying flatness adds cost with no benefit.
Silicon Nitride – if thermal fatigue is the failure mode you cannot fix
Thermal cycling opens cracks. Each heating and cooling cycle grows them a little more. Most ceramics fail from fatigue, not from a single over‑temperature event. Silicon nitride’s CTE is 3.2 × 10⁻⁶/K – low enough to survive a ΔT of 800°C without initiating a crack that grows.
Plant data from aluminum riser tubes shows service life jumping from 6 months to over 2 years after switching from SiC to Si₃N₄. For welding nozzles, the arc heat cycles every weld, and weld quality drops when the nozzle erodes. Si₃N₄ holds its bore diameter through 20,000+ welds. For bearing balls running at high speed and high temperature, it retains hardness and fracture toughness up to 1200°C.
Also used for: turbine components in small gas generators, tappet shims in high‑performance engines, and guide rollers in glass forming lines where the roller runs at 800°C and picks up 200°C cycles every minute. If your process has heating and cooling built into the cycle, not just steady‑state high temperature, Si₃N₄ is often the right call.
We need your thermal cycle data to quote Si₃N₄ – not just the peak, but the ramp rate and the number of cycles per shift. That determines whether we recommend standard grade or a finer‑grained variant with higher toughness. If you do not have that data, we can help you estimate it from your existing failure patterns.
Silicon Carbide – when your kiln beams sag and you cannot shut down
Continuous tunnel kilns run 24/7. A sagging support beam means rollers jam, ware tips, and you lose a full shift to recovery. Recrystallized SiC (RSiC) holds flexural strength of 250–350 MPa up to 1650°C because it does not creep the way oxide ceramics do. The recrystallized structure, no binder phase, means no softening at temperature.
We produce RSiC to your exact furnace dimensions – support beams, kiln rollers, protection tubes. Lengths up to 1000mm, with custom hole patterns, stepped diameters, or flanged ends. We also supply nitride‑bonded SiC for lower temperature but higher corrosion environments. The difference is in the bonding phase and the maximum operating temperature. We will recommend one over the other based on whether creep or corrosion is your primary failure mode.
Also used for: radiant tube protectors, dross skimmers in aluminum melting, and cyclone liners in high‑temperature gas handling. If the part sees load at high temperature – mechanical load, not just thermal – SiC is usually the first material we consider.
Before quoting, we ask: are you replacing an existing failed beam, or building a new kiln layout? Replacement parts need exact dimensional match to existing kiln furniture. New layouts give us room to optimize wall thickness and support spacing. Different answers yield different quotes.
Boron Nitride – when molten metal clogs every nozzle you try
Aluminum, zinc, and copper wet most ceramics. Once they wet, they stick, build up, and clog the nozzle in a few hours. Hexagonal BN does not wet, molten metal beads up and runs off. That means longer nozzle life and fewer production stops for cleaning or replacement.
H‑BN also handles 2000°C in inert gas or vacuum, making it suitable for melt‑atomization nozzles and high‑vacuum fixtures. But, and this is important, h‑BN oxidizes above 900°C in air. We do not recommend it for air atmosphere. If you are running air above 900°C, we will suggest an alternative. We would rather lose a quote than sell a part that fails in your furnace because the data sheet did not mention the oxidation limit.
Also used for: neutron shielding windows in nuclear instrumentation, plasma torch insulators, and crucible liners in high‑purity melting where the crucible cannot contaminate the melt. If the application involves non‑wetting requirement or vacuum service, h‑BN is usually on the shortlist.
We need to confirm your atmosphere before we recommend BN – vacuum, inert, or reducing gas are fine. Air at 1200°C is not. If you are not sure what your furnace atmosphere actually is during operation, we can help you check, because we have seen plants where the “inert” line was leaking air and BN parts failed in weeks instead of years.
Magnesium Oxide – above 1700°C, most ceramics stop working
At 1800°C, alumina is near its limit. Zirconia is still stable but expensive and difficult to machine. MgO holds structural stability up to 2000°C, with a melting point at 2852°C, and it resists basic slags and alkali metals that attack other oxides.
We supply MgO in two forms: dense sintered shapes for crucibles and insulators, and crushable beads for filling armored thermocouples and mineral‑insulated cables. For metallurgical sampling, we recommend specific grain sizes based on your melt chemistry – different slags require different densities and grain boundaries to survive more than one dip.
Also used for: electrolyte tubes in high‑temperature sensors, crucibles for melting platinum group metals, and insulating sleeves in ultra‑high‑temperature furnaces (above 2000°C) where the insulation has to stay electrically isolated from the heating element.
We need your melt composition or slag chemistry if you are using MgO in contact with molten metal. The same MgO grade that lasts 50 dips in one melt can fail in 5 dips in another because of a different slag chemistry. We will ask and we will spec the right grain size and density for your specific metal.
Machinable glass ceramic – the prototype that has to run tomorrow
You need 10 parts for a trial assembly. Diamond grinding takes weeks. Tooling costs more than the parts. Hard tooling for injection molding makes no sense for 10 pieces. Machinable glass ceramic fixes this: standard HSS tooling, ±0.013 mm tolerance, no post‑firing. You go from CAD file to finished part in days, not weeks.
Zero porosity means it does not trap process gases or outgas in vacuum, so your prototype performance is representative of what a fully sintered ceramic would do, without the wait. It also handles 1000°C without load and 800°C continuously, which covers most prototype temperature ranges. For aerospace insulators, medical device components, and vacuum fixturing, this is often the shortest path between design approval and test data.
Also used for: electrical feedthroughs in high‑vacuum chambers, sensor housings that need to be electrically insulating but structurally sound, and any application where the geometry is complex and the quantity is below 100 pieces per year. If you are still iterating the design, machinable glass ceramic lets you test three geometry variations in the time it would take to get one hard‑tooled part.
Send us your STEP file and tell us the application temperature. If the geometry has features we typically see blind holes, thin walls, sharp internal corners, and we will flag potential issues before we quote. We have failed enough glass ceramic parts on our own machines to know where the breaking points are. We will tell you before you order, not after.
Metal Ceramic Heaters (MCH) – Integrated Thermal Solutions for Precision Heating
In semiconductor processing and analytical instrumentation, heating element failure or non-uniform temperature distribution directly affects yield and measurement accuracy. Metal Ceramic Heaters combine a tungsten or molybdenum heating circuit embedded in a ceramic matrix – typically alumina or aluminum nitride – to achieve ramp rates up to 80°C per second and temperature uniformity within ±1°C across the heating surface. The ceramic encapsulation protects the heating element from oxidation and process contamination, extending service life compared to bare metal or quartz heaters. We design MCH systems for wafer processing, capillary electrophoresis, and gas chromatography applications where rapid, uniform, and contaminant-free heating is specified.
Explore Ceramic Heaters (MCH) →
Precision Engineering & Customization
Stop wondering if your design will crack during sintering.
We check wall thickness, fillet radii, and draft angles before production. So you don’t discover warping or cracking after weeks of waiting.
Not sure if your assembly can handle a 0.1mm mismatch?
We hold as-sintered parts to ±0.1mm, then grind down to ±0.005mm on critical surfaces. So your press-fit or vacuum seal works the first time, not the third.
Need a ceramic part larger than your current supplier can handle?
We produce components up to 1000mm in length or diameter. So you don’t have to split your design into multiple pieces or switch to a less suitable material just because of size limits.
Global Fulfillment & Reliability
Worried about how long ceramic machining takes?
We run all ceramics in-house on CNC equipment configured specifically for hard materials – feeds, speeds, and tooling are different from metal, and we have the setup to handle both green-state and fully sintered parts.
Ready-to-Ship Stock
We stock 5000+ tubes, plates, and crucibles in common dimensions. Stock orders ship within 72-96 hours. If you need custom, we quote lead time during DFM review – typically 15-25 working days, so you can plan without guesswork.
Worried your parts will arrive broken and you’ll waste weeks waiting for replacements?
We use double-layer foam inside ISPM 15-certified wooden crates. Our breakage rate on international shipments over the past three years is below 0.3%. So you don’t have to order spares “just in case” and tie up your budget.
Advanced Ceramic Properties Comparison
| Material Type | Max Temp (°C) | Thermal Cond. (W/m·K) | Primary Strength |
|---|---|---|---|
| Alumina (95%-99.7%) | 1600 – 1750 | 30 | General Insulation & Cost-efficiency |
| Zirconia (Y-PSZ) | 2000 – 2400 | 2.2 | Fracture Toughness & Mechanical Stress |
| Aluminum Nitride (AlN) | 1800 (Inert) | 170 – 230 | Extreme Thermal Conductivity |
| Boron Nitride (BN) | 2400 (Inert) | 60 | Non-Wetting & Vacuum Stability |
| Silicon Nitride (Si3N4) | 1200 – 1400 | 30 | Thermal Shock & Corrosion Resistance |
| Silicon Carbide (RSiC) | 1650 | 40 – 50 | High-Load Structural Stiffness |
| Magnesium Oxide (MgO) | 2400+ | 45 | Ultra High-Temp Sensors & MgO Insulation |
| Glass Ceramic | 800 – 1000 | 1.5 | Rapid Prototyping & High Precision |
*Note: Values vary by purity. For professional material evaluation, please contact Gurdoo engineers.
Before You Custom‑Order – Questions OEM Engineers Ask Most
What if my design requires a tolerance that you have not machined before in this material?
A: We run a DFM (Design for Manufacturability) review on every new drawing before we cut any material. We check wall thickness, fillet radii, draft angles, hole depth‑to‑diameter ratios, and tolerance stack‑ups against our forming and sintering capabilities for that specific material.
If your callout is tighter than our standard process can hold, we propose an alternative path – a different grade, an intermediate grinding step, or a design tweak that preserves function while improving yield. We do not quote blind and hope it works. For your first custom part, we produce sample coupons with your critical features and measure everything before we run the full batch.
If the material does not exist in our standard portfolio, we tell you upfront. We do not say “we can do it” and figure it out later.
The prototype worked, but how do I know batch #2 will be dimensionally identical to batch #1?
A: Ceramic parts shrink during sintering and every batch of raw material has a slightly different shrinkage curve. We do not guess or rely on a single “standard shrink rate”. We measure green‑state dimensions and fired dimensions on every batch, track the delta, and adjust forming tooling or pressing pressure to compensate for batch‑to‑batch raw material variation.
We maintain a batch‑specific shrinkage log for every production run. When you reorder, we pull the data from your prior batch, recalibrate the forming parameters against the new material lot, and produce a first‑article inspection report that confirms dimensions before we run the full quantity. Your second batch matches your first batch, not “close enough”.
For critical features, we also offer post‑sinter grinding as a secondary operation to bring dimensions to tolerance – independent of shrinkage variation. We recommend this for ±0.01mm features, since sintering alone cannot guarantee that range.
I already have a supplier, why should I take the risk of switching?
A: You have a supplier. Switching sounds like work. So let us take the work out of trying us.
Here is what we propose: pick the part that fails most often or costs the most to replace. Send us the drawing. We will quote it, match your current grade, and run a sample batch – 10 to 20 pieces – while you keep running your existing supplier. You test our parts on your line, alongside theirs. If our parts perform better, you ramp. If they do not, you stay with your current supplier. You lose nothing – not a day of production, not a dollar of tooling, not a minute of downtime.
We do not ask you to switch. We suggest you to test. If we are better, you win. If we are not, you are right back where you started – with zero interruption, zero risk, and a clear data point that your current supplier is still the right choice. That is not a bad outcome. It is a data‑driven decision either way.
Send us your most failure‑prone ceramic part drawing. We will quote the sample and let your own line data make the call, not our sales pitch.