106 Hamdan Yahya et al., 2018 Original Research Article | Open Access | AMCT 2017 Malaysia | Special Issue ISSN : 2581-4311 International Journal of Current Science, Engineering & Technology Fabrication and Characterization of Anorthite-Based Porcelain using Malaysian Mineral Resources Hamdan YAHYA 1,a* , Abdul Rois ABDUL MOIS 1,b and Aspaniza AHMAD 1,c 1 Mineral Research Center, Jalan Sultan Azlan Shah, 31400 Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia. a hamdanppm05@gmail.com, b rois@jmg.gov.my, c aspaniza@jmg.gov.my ABSTRACT. The purpose of this study is to design a porcelain based on anorthite whose properties will fulfill the tableware market requirements such as high appearance quality and strength. To obtain the anorthite based porcelain, minerals such as ball clay, quartz, feldspar and dolomite were used as raw materials. The anorthite porcelain test pieces were fabricated by uniaxial pressing with 65 MPa and followed by sintering at 1100 °C, 1120 °C, 1150 °C, 1180 °C and 1200 °C for 1 hour soaking. The maximum flexural strength achieved was ~73 MPa when the dolomite used was less than 10 wt.% (TP2) and is comparable with that of the conventional porcelain. Keywords: Anorthite-based ceramics, Porcelain, Ceramic table wares; Received: 15.10.2017, Revised: 15.12.2017, Accepted: 30.02.2018, and Online: 20.03.2018; DOI: 10.30967/ijcrset.1.S1.2018.106-111 Selection and/or Peer-review under responsibility of Advanced Materials Characterization Techniques (AMCT 2017), Malaysia. 1. INTRODUCTION Bone china is a highly specialized product in terms of its appearance such as excellent whiteness and good translucency which make it the most premium type of tablewares in the world. Typical composition of bone china bodies are 50 wt.% bone ash, 25 wt.% china clay or kaolin and 25 wt.% feldspar. After sintering, the phases in the fired body usually consisted of 40 wt.% β-tricalcium phosphate (β-Ca3(PO4)2), 30 wt.% anorthite (CaO.Al2O3.2SiO2) and 30 wt.% calcium aluminosilicate glass [1]. Hence, bone china bodies are extremely crystalline which possessed good resistance to chipping and having high flexural strength of value about 100 MPa. Unfortunately, bone china bodies require higher firing temperature to develop maturity in the sintered body. Typically, bone china was sintered at temperature about 1230 °C and then the glaze applied and fired on at the range of 1050 – 1100 °C. Usually, the bone ash used was produced from de-gelatinizing of cattle bones with steam to remove most of the organic matter and then calcined at about 1000 °C [2]. Undoubtedly, non-halal bones were used in production of the bone ash, especially in the major regions of the world. Thus, it had become a sensitive issue and as such it is not preferred by global Muslim consumers. Therefore, another source CaO was studied in the production of anorthite-based porcelain such as dolomite (CaCO3. MgCO3), limestone (CaCO3), wollastonite (CaO.SiO2) and calcite (CaCO3). Nowadays, dolomite was mainly used in the production of anorthite-based porcelain as a CaO source. In Malaysia, dolomite are abundant and cheaper than the other calcium containing minerals. In previous study, anorthite-based porcelain using dolomite as a source of CaO was sintered at low temperature which was less than 1200 °C [1]. This will reduce the cost of production of ceramic tableware products having good physical properties comparable to bone china and unequivocally guaranteed to be halal. In this work, anorthite-based porcelain were prepared using the Malaysian mineral resources namely clay, silica sand and dolomite.