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Ceramics
These materials include pottery and bricks as examples.
They....
- are solids made by baking a starting material in a very hot oven or kiln
- are hard and tough
- have very many different uses
Ceramics tend to have very high melting points and are good thermal insulators. However, they can be very brittle. Think what happens in pottery is dropped!
Composites
These are made from two or more different materials that are connected together in some way, such as being meshed or layered in some way. The different materials are chosen in a way that their individual properties come together to produce a 'composite' material which behaves in a very different way to any of the individual components!
Examples...
MDF - made from wood fibres and glue.
Fibreglass - made from glass fibres in a strong polymer resin.
Reinforced concrete - made from steel rods arranged in normal concrete.
Breathable fabrics
The outer layer is usually made from nylon (strong)
The membrane is made from the polymer PTFE with tiny holes in it to allow water molecules from sweat to escape, but too small to allow big rain drops in!
The soft lining is often made from polyurethane.
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