Study on preparation of Pb(Zr,Ti)O/sub 3/ thin-films on TiNi SMA substrates using sol-gel techniques

The authors investigate piezoelectric Pb(Zr,Ti)O/sub 3/ thin films on shape memory alloy TiNi substrates prepared by a sol-gel process. Lead acetate, zirconium isopropoxide and titanium n-butyloxide dissolved respectively in a solvent were mixed under nitrogen to form a precursor solution. The resultant solution was spun onto the TiNi SMA substrates at 2000 rpm for 30s. The amorphous thin films were crystallized by annealing in air. It was found that the crack-free PZT thin films displayed good mechanical bonding with the TiNi substrates.