prEN 15991

Testing of ceramic raw materials and ceramic materials - Direct determination of mass fractions of impurities in powders and granules of silicon carbide by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry with electrothermal vaporisation (ETV-ICP-OES) prEN 15991

Scope

This document defines a method for the determination of the mass fractions of the elements Al, Ca, Cr, Cu, Fe, Mg, Ni, Ti, V and Zr in powdered and granular silicon carbide.
Dependent on element, emission lines, plasma conditions and sample mass, this test method is applicable for mass fractions of the above trace contaminations from about 0,1 mg/kg to about 1 000 mg/kg, after evaluation also from 0,001 mg/kg to about 5 000 mg/kg.
NOTE 1 Generally for optical emission spectrometry using inductively coupled plasma and electrothermal vaporization (ETV-ICP-OES) there is a linear working range of up to four orders of magnitude. This range can be expanded for the respective elements by variation of the sample mass or by choosing emission lines with different sensitivity.
After adequate verification, the standard is also applicable to further metallic elements (excepting Rb and Cs) and some non-metallic contaminations (like P and S) and other allied non-metallic powdered or granular materials like carbides, nitrides, graphite, soot, coke, coal, and some other oxidic materials (see [1], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9] and [10]).
NOTE 2 There is positive experience with materials like, for example, graphite, boron carbide (B4C), silicon nitride (Si3N4), boron nitride (BN) and several metal oxides as well as with the determination of P and S in some of these materials.