This study investigates the dip coating fabrication process in detail. First the slurry formulation development is presented. This includes optimizing the concentration of slurry components. Controlling the coating thickness is then addressed. It is shown that a broad range of uniform thicknesses from a few microns up to a few hundreds of microns is achievable by adjusting the solid loading and/or the dip coating rate. This study reports that dip coating is a commercially reliable technique to fabricate micro-tubular solid oxide fuel cells not only because it is low cost but, more importantly, because it is fairly reproducible and highly controllable. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.