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X-ray Machine for Ceramic Knife
Get frustrated trying to identify defects in your ceramic knives during manufacturing? UNI X-ray offers effective X-ray solutions for your ceramic knives inspection.
- Enable to identify errors or flaws to avoid product recalls and rejection
- Easy to recognize the location of defects, helping you improve production efficiency
- Ensure to detect the defects of knives to avoid any injury that it may cause to the user
Ceramic Knife Inspection X-ray Machine for Sale
Ceramic knives are used in the kitchen and various other applications because they offer several benefits, including high strength and anti-corrosion capabilities.
However, the utmost care and precision-based manufacturing process must be used to get a high-quality ceramic knife with all its benefits. Manufacturers often struggle to ensure that their ceramic knives come out without any cracks that might affect the quality of the knife.
Here’s the good news: we offer X-ray machine for your to ensure the quality of ceramic knives manufacturing.
Why Global Clients Choose Us?
20 Years of Expertise
We have over 18 years of experience that specializes in X-ray Technology.
Excellent Image Quality
Uni X-ray produces X-ray machines that offer excellent and ultra-sharp image qualities.
High Degree of Safety
Our X-ray machine is one of the safest choices you can make because it ensures maximum safety.
Extremely User-friendly
Uni X-ray produces machines that have an easy mode of operation.
Services We Provide
Installation Guideline
We offer you free and quick installation instruction with online video tutorials. The tutorial explains detailed and important steps to get your machine started. Any questions about installation, feel free to contact us!
Customer Support
We work to provide the best customer support. We are here to help you solve any problems you may encounter. Feel free to contact us Uni X-ray team online via video chat, phone, or email anytime.
Quick Delivery
Online equipment shipped within 45 days and offline equipment within 20 days after payment confirmation. The customized machine is supposed to be deliveded in less than 90 days.
Warranty Service
Uni X-ray machine comes with a one-year warranty. In the warranty period, machine defects, repairs, and part changes are free. Unexpected damage issues due to shipment, handling, storage, abuse, or misuse will not be covered.
Installation Guideline
We offer you free and quick installation instruction with online video tutorials. The tutorial explains detailed and important steps to get your machine started. Any questions about installation, feel free to contact us!
Customer Support
We work to provide the best customer support. We are here to help you solve any problems you may encounter. Feel free to contact us Uni X-ray team online via video chat, phone, or email anytime.
Quick Delivery
Online equipment shipped within 45 days and offline equipment within 20 days after payment confirmation. The customized machine is supposed to be deliveded in less than 90 days.
Warranty Service
Uni X-ray machine comes with a one-year warranty. In the warranty period, machine defects, repairs, and part changes are free. Unexpected damage issues due to shipment, handling, storage, abuse, or misuse will not be covered.
X-ray Machine for Ceramic Knife Crack Inspection: the Beginner’s Guide
Table of Contents
1. What is a Ceramic Knife?
Ceramic knives are often the result of combining ceramic powder and a binding agent to form a homogeneous compound that is shaped using controlled temperature and pressure.
The challenge during the production process is obtaining a consistent mixture because the more consistent you can make the mixture, the harder the ceramic knife you will get.
The final product from this combination is a non-metallic and chemically non-reactive knife material that is free from corrosion and very strong.
The main component is a clayey-like material called Zirconia, about 90% or more of the ceramic compound, and Yttrium oxide, which is about 10% or less.
Manufacturers combine these materials with water and then mix them mechanically to get a homogenous compound.
Drying and shaping processes follow, after which a 10,000-psi pressure, 1400˚C temperature, and edge sharpening completes the process of making a ceramic knife.
2. What is an X-ray Machine for Ceramic Knife Crack Inspection?
X-ray machines are radiation-generating equipment that you can use to inspect materials for consistency and quality.
Most inspection tools and equipment often find it challenging to identify tiny defects like micro-cracks and other inherent flaws.
That’s where the X-ray machine comes in as it projects radiation energy on the ceramic knife, which then absorbs some of the energy.
The remaining energy reaches the detector on the opposite side of the ceramic knife, which then generates a representative image of the test sample.
Analysis of this image reveals the presence or absence of any damage or defect that might reduce the quality of the ceramic knife.
However, the quality of the image is a crucial factor to getting an accurate analysis and result of the knife.
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3. Why do Ceramic Knives Need to be Inspected?
Leaving out the inspection process during the manufacture of ceramic knives means you’re leaving out a critical aspect of the production.
You never want to leave the quality of your product to chance as this can have negative financial implications on your brand.
Here are some fundamental reasons why you need to take the inspection of ceramic knives seriously.
- Help Product Quality Improvement
When manufacturing ceramic knives, the expectation is that they should conform to both local and international quality standards as these knives sometimes come in contact with food substances.
Any defects like cracks and porosity can affect the quality of these ceramic knives, making them substandard products.
Inspection during and after manufacturing ensures that you can identify any errors or flaws present in the knives before leaving the manufacturing facility.
Furthermore, it will help you avoid product recalls and rejection and its associated costs implication while saving the company’s reputation.
- Facilitate the Production Efficiency
Inspecting ceramic knives during manufacture not only helps you to identify defects and errors but helps you to make your production processes efficient.
The reason is that you can recognize the areas where the defects come into the production of ceramic knives, and it helps you to correct the anomalies in the production process.
This correction helps to reduce the occurrence of flaws and rejection of your products as the quality increases.
- Ensure User Safety
Manufacturers strive to meet local and international safety standards that ensure the safety of users of their products.
A defect in the ceramic knife can be the source of bodily harm to the user if not detected during manufacture.
Inspection of ceramic knives helps detect the presence of these defects during production and helps to avoid any injury that it may cause to the user.
4. Some Basic Knowledge about Ceramic Knife
Having some basic understanding of ceramic knives, including their composition, production processes, and structure, help you determine the best ways to guarantee adequate inspection.
Here is the essential information you need to have about ceramic knives.
① Material
The constituent materials that make up ceramic knives are two, and they include Zirconia and Yttrium Oxide in specific proportions.
Of the two materials, Zirconia constitutes up to 80% or more of the ceramic knives, while Yttrium Oxide makes up about 20% or less of the total makeup.
However, some manufacturers include materials like magnesium and calcium as enhancers to the production process.
Nonetheless, the more homogenous the mixture of the constituents is, the better the ceramic knife will turn out.
② Structure
The structure of the ceramic knife determines its durability and modes of failure, and you can examine it using its porosity, cutting edge angle, and appearance.
- Porosity
Standard ceramic knives have pores that determine other properties like sharpness and edge retention, which can affect their performance and efficiency.
However, the porosity for standard ceramic knives falls under specific ranges to ensure that they perform optimally.
Porosity for a quality ceramic knife should not be more than 1.5%, and the maximum pore size should not exceed 25 micrometers.
With a porosity of 0.1%, a ceramic knife has a sharpness of 100mm, and as low as 50mm with a porosity of 0.5%.
It means that porosity reduces the sharpness of ceramic knives and should be considered critically during production and inspection.
- Cutting Edge Angle
The angle of the cutting edge for a ceramic knife is also critical to the knife’s sharpness and edge retention.
The relationship between the cutting edge can be seen as inverse to the sharpness since the greater the cutting-edge angle, the lesser the knife’s sharpness.
This relationship also affects the safety of the user since more sharpness increases the knife’s cutting ability and increases the probability of causing injury to the user.
The requirement for a standard knife includes a cutting-edge angle of not more than 40˚, a distance of 25mm from the handle for users’ safety, and a thickness of not more than 0.46mm.
Nonetheless, you should understand that with greater sharpness comes a reduction in the edge retention ability of the knife.
- Appearance and Cracks
Certain defects often occur during the production of ceramic knives, and these defects affect the aesthetics of the knives and their quality.
The appearance can indicate an inherent flaw introduced during the manufacturing process and should form part of the basis for quality assessments of ceramic knives.
These defects include chips, cracks, scratches, color specks, deformations, and excessive porosity. Blemishes like these can affect the integrity of the knives to perform satisfactorily and can even become a safety concern for the users.
Suitable inspection methods like X-ray solutions are required to conduct quality inspections and assessments to identify these flaws during the manufacturing process.
③ Manufacturing Process
Producing a ceramic knife is another requirement for understanding the best suitable inspection method it demands.
Processes like mixing in drums, subjecting to controlled temperature and pressure are required to manufacture a standard ceramic knife.
These processes mean that its properties, including brittleness and strength, need to be considered during testing.
Hence, non-destructive testing methods like X-ray machines are usually the best as X-rays can examine the integrity of ceramic knives without needing any physical contacts that might damage the knife.
5. Methods to Detect Cracks in Ceramic Knives
The quality of the ceramic knives you produce is vital as it guarantees that they will perform effectively and not harm the user.
Therefore, it is essential to find a suitable method to analyze ceramic knives during production to identify the presence of flaws like cracks that might reduce their quality.
Here you’ll find the most popular methods used in ceramic knife production to ascertain the presence of cracks.
- Visual Inspection
Visual inspection is one of the most basic forms of inspecting ceramic knives for cracks, as the only tools needed for this are the eyes.
It is often the last level of inspection to ascertain things like color specks or stains and dimensional requirements.
Though the inspector can quickly sight large enough cracks, other smaller cracks, including microcracks, will be challenging to identify using only visual inspection.
✓ Pros:
A visual inspection is an inexpensive form of assessment as inspectors do not need extensive equipment with highly automated functions during an inspection.
It is also relatively fast, especially when inspecting small quantities of samples.
❏ Limits:
However, using visual inspection alone can be grossly inadequate for smaller defects like micro-cracks, tiny pores, and other inherent weaknesses.
It is also not practical for inspecting large quantities of samples as it can become tiring for the inspector.
Furthermore, it is susceptible to human errors since the inspection accuracy is only as good as the inspector’s eyesight and level of attention to detail.
Lastly, visual inspection is not cost-effective. Any crack missed by the inspector can lead to recalls and rejects by the users, which can be very expensive for the manufacturer.
- Red-absorption Test
This test method measures the porosity and the presence of cracks using the rate of absorption of a standard compound often prepared for absorption by the ceramic knife.
✓ Pros:
It is effective for identifying porosity in a ceramic knife and large cracks that might not be visible enough for the eye.
❏ Limits:
The most significant limitation of this test is its inability to accurately detect cracks in colored ceramic knives which makes it only suitable for white ceramics.
Also, it is inefficient for identifying micro-cracks but only effective for macro-cracks like for visual inspection.
- Penetration Test
The penetration test relies on the penetration of certain dyes into the ceramic knives. These dyes are known as penetrant and can be applied to the surface of ceramic knives by soaking or spraying.
It is left for a considerable amount of time to allow proper penetration to establish a crack or discontinuity in the grain of the ceramic knife.
The inspector applies a developer that helps to bring the penetrant to the surface after cleaning the excess penetrant from the surface.
This developer exposes cracks that might have been too small and unnoticeable for the eyes. The type of penetrant employed determines if the sample is viewed under white light or UV light.
✓ Pros:
It is a non-destructive testing method which guarantees that manufacturers can use the material if cracks are absent after the testing.
The penetration test is one of the most inexpensive forms of non-destructive testing.
❏ Limits:
It is suitable primarily for metallic materials, and it combines with visual inspection in the testing process, which is subject to human errors and the inspector’s expertise.
- Metallographic Examination
The metallographic examination uses microscopic lenses and cameras to observe ceramic knives’ grain size and microstructure under inverted lighting.
✓ Pros:
It can detect micro-cracks as well as porosity at the microscopic level.
❏ Limits:
Metallographic is well-suited for metals than ceramic. Also, the abrasion involved in the testing can damage the ceramic material making it unfit for use.
- X-ray Screening
X-ray screening uses the level of radiation absorption by the ceramic knife to generate an image that a radiography technician can analyze to recognize any defect in a ceramic knife.
An X-ray machine generates radiation from its X-ray tube and projects it on the ceramic knife, absorbing some radiation.
The remaining unabsorbed radiation gets to the detector on the opposite end of the sample and generates an image using the radiation getting to it.
The quality of the image determines the ease of analysis as quality images clearly show the presence of any defect.
✓ Pros:
X-ray screening has many benefits, including high precision and accuracy of results, as X-rays can penetrate hidden features to expose inherent defects that are difficult for the eyes to see.
It is also very fast and effective for large samples that might wear out an inspector using visual inspection or other physically tasking methods.
X-ray screening is very cost-effective as it reduces the frequency of recalls and rejects, which might significantly increase the production cost.
This inspection can come at any time, including before, during, and after the production of the knife.
Additionally, X-ray screening helps improve production efficiency with automation options that require a minimal human interface. It also enables you to identify points in the production process that introduce errors to fix them.
❏ Limits:
X-ray screening requires big equipment and trained personnel to handle the operation of the X-ray machine and the analysis of the image.
The initial cost of the machine can also be significant. However, it gives high returns on investment.
6. Why is X-ray Machine the Best Method to Detect Ceramic Knife Crack?
The numerous benefits that X-ray machines offer for inspecting cracks make them the best for detecting cracks in ceramic knives.
Firstly, being a non-destructive method for checking cracks means that ceramic knives that have been certified free of cracks can still be part of the final product.
Unlike destructive methods that destroy the samples during tests and as such renders the ceramic knives useless.
The use of quality images for analysis also helps detect cracks quickly and accurately within a ceramic knife, which is one of the benefits of using X-ray machines.
Furthermore, the high-level precision of X-ray machines makes it an exceptional tool for assessing other properties and dimensional attributes of ceramic knives.
7. How Much does it Cost to Buy an X-ray Machine for Ceramic Knife Crack Inspection?
The cost of purchasing an X-ray machine depends on several factors that you should consider before engaging a manufacturer.
Your inspection needs and the number of defects you are trying to identify can increase the cost for starters.
Also, the level of automation that you desire can immensely contribute to the cost of purchase, as complete automation can be very expensive.
Choosing a foreign brand from Europe or the US can significantly increase the cost, whereas foreign brands from Chinese manufacturers are often less expensive for the same quality.
Considering all these factors can get you an X-ray machine for as low as $45,000 or as high as $600,000.
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8.The Best X-ray Machine Supplier in China – Uni X-ray
You’ll find one outstanding Chinese X-ray machine supplier, Uni X-ray, with almost two decades of quality delivery and a consistent track record of excellent customer support.
Uni X-ray has an advantaged location in China’s Silicon Valley of Shenzhen, where many radiography subject matter experts are.
This location advantage makes X-ray solutions comparatively less expensive than producing them in Europe or the US.
Uni X-ray is deeply rooted in research and development, which has helped produce some of the most innovative X-ray solutions for clients across the globe.
The excellent after-sales support team of Uni X-ray has earned them credibility and a lot of opportunities to partner with blue-chip clients who trust Uni X-ray’s brand.
Here’s the complete guide on the best x-ray equipment supplier all around the world, have a check if you’re interested in.
Conclusion
In all, ceramic knives offer various benefits over metallic knives, including anti-rust and very high strength. These benefits make them preferable for cutting multiple items, including food items.
However, cracks are the undoing of ceramic knives and can enhance the integrity and performance of a ceramic knife.
The solution is getting a suitable X-ray solution provider as X-ray offers accurate and precise inspection solutions for detecting cracks in ceramic knives.