Creep behavior of sintered nano-silver at high temperature: Experimental and theoretical analysis

Creep experiments were conducted on self-designed cylindrical specimens of sintered nano-silver at temperatures ranging from 298 K to 523 K. The creep behavior of sintered nano-silver at different temperatures was investigated. It was observed that an increase in temperature led to significant softening, accompanied by an increase in the maximum strain from 0.26 to 0.889. Additionally, the creep rate showed accelerated decay, with the rate rapidly approaching zero for temperatures exceeding 373 K, indicating a strong temperature dependence. Based on material microstructure characterization techniques and finite element analysis, it shows that the high temperature sensitivity of sintered nano-silver creep is primarily attributed to void formation. A new theoretical model has been developed based on the theory of entropy increment, which can accurately predict the creep strain of sintered nano-silver compared with the experimental data, the key factors influencing the creep behavior has been analyzed. The current study presents a more accurate description strategy regarding the high-temperature creep behavior of sintered nano-silver. Compared with the conventional creep models, the proposed model can accurately capture the softening properties of sintered nano-silver.