Characterization of silicon carbide platelet-reinforced alumina

Author(s):  
K. B. Alexander ◽  
P. F. Becher ◽  
S. B. Waters

The incorporation of silicon carbide whiskers into ceramic matrices has been shown to result in significant increases in toughness, strength, resistance to thermal shock, slow crack growth, and creep. The health hazards associated with the handling of silicon carbide whiskers, however, can be considerable. Silicon carbide platelets are therefore being considered as an alternative to whiskers for reinforcing ceramic composites.The silicon carbide platelets used in this study were supplied by Alcan International Ltd. The platelets varied from 1 to 5 μm in thickness and 5 to 45 μm in diameter. Sumitomo alumina powder was mixed with the platelets and the composites were fabricated by hot-pressing in vacuum at 1600°C for 1.5 h. The resultant composites had the platelet faces oriented primarily perpendicular to the hot-pressing axis. Specimens containing 7 vol% SiC platelets had a fracture toughness of 6.6 MPa m½, which is about the same value as observed for alumina of equivalent grain size containing 7 vol% SiC whiskers. Considerable porosity was observed in specimens with platelet volume fractions larger than 7 vol%.

Author(s):  
X. Zhang ◽  
Y. Pan ◽  
T.T. Meek

Industrial microwave heating technology has emerged as a new ceramic processing technique. The unique advantages of fast sintering, high density, and improved materials properties makes it superior in certain respects to other processing methods. This work presents the structure characterization of a microwave sintered ceramic matrix composite.Commercial α-alumina powder A-16 (Alcoa) is chosen as the matrix material, β-silicon carbide whiskers (Third Millennium Technologies, Inc.) are used as the reinforcing element. The green samples consisted of 90 vol% Al2O3 powder and 10 vol% ultrasonically-dispersed SiC whiskers. The powder mixture is blended together, and then uniaxially pressed into a cylindrical pellet under a pressure of 230 MPa, which yields a 52% green density. The sintering experiments are carried out using an industry microwave system (Gober, Model S6F) which generates microwave radiation at 2.45 GHz with a maximum output power of 6 kW. The composites are sintered at two different temperatures (1550°C and 1650°C) with various isothermal processing time intervals ranging from 10 to 20 min.


1991 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-111 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. R. Karasek ◽  
S. A. Bradley ◽  
J. T. Donner ◽  
H. C. Yeh ◽  
J. L. Schienle

2017 ◽  
Vol 714 ◽  
pp. 270-277 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fang-xu Niu ◽  
Yan-xiang Wang ◽  
Lian-Ru Ma ◽  
Shan-long Fu ◽  
Imran Abbas ◽  
...  

AIHAJ ◽  
1991 ◽  
Vol 52 (8) ◽  
pp. 315-319 ◽  
Author(s):  
Douglas K. Craig ◽  
Charles A. Lapin ◽  
Gary E. Butterfield

2007 ◽  
Vol 1044 ◽  
Author(s):  
Takashi Itoh ◽  
Nobuhisa Asari ◽  
Nobuyuki Kanetake ◽  
Akira Okada

AbstractThermoelectric power generation is a hopeful method harnessing waste thermal energy particularly covering a middle temperature range between 500 and 800K. A Zn4Sb3 compound is a promising “phonon glass electron crystal” material applicable to thermoelectric power generation around 700K. This material, however, has a problem of its brittleness. In this research, the silicon carbide whiskers were added into the Zn4Sb3 compound for overcoming the brittleness, and the fullerene nanoparticles were also added for improving the thermoelectric performance. The Zn4Sb3 compound was synthesized from mixture of pure zinc and antimony powders by a liquid-solid phase reactions method. Firstly, the synthesized compound powder was mixed with the fullerene nanoparticles. The planetary ball milling method was used in order to disentangle the fullerene agglomerate and to obtain a uniform mixture. Subsequently, the mixture was uniformly mixed with the SiC whiskers by the planetary ball milling. The final mixture was consolidated by the pulse discharge sintering. The synthesized phases were identified by XRD. The morphology of the whiskers after mixing was observed. The flexural strength and the thermoelectric properties of the sintered samples were measured. The length of SiC whiskers and the flexural strength were decreased with the mixing time. Though the addition of SiC whiskers lowered the thermoelectric performance, the combined addition of SiC whiskers and fullerene nanoparticles restored the performance by especially decrease of the thermoelectric conductivity owing to the phonon scattering.


Author(s):  
L. F. Allard ◽  
T. A. Nolan

The internal structure and surface crystallography of ceramic whiskers are of interest because of their increasing importance as second phase reinforcements in a variety of matrix materials. Whiskers are typically 0.5 to 5 um in diameter with aspect ratios of 10 to 100 or more. Silicon carbide whiskers are the best known; they are usually grown by vapor-liquid-solid (VLS) or other processes from either natural (e.g. rice hulls) or synthetic materials. Titanium nitride whiskers are also of interest because of their potential for applications where SiC whiskers are not suitable (e.g. ferrous alloys). This paper highlights some of the details of SiC and TiN whisker ultrastructure.


Author(s):  
L. F. Allard ◽  
P. Pendleton ◽  
J. S. Brinen

Silicon carbide whiskers are of interest as dispersed phase strengthened in metals, ceramics, and polymer composites. Characterization of whisker structure, including surface morphology, crystallography and chemistry, is important so that whisker models can be devised on which calculations of surface energetics controlling wetting/bonding phenomena can be accurately based. In current work, the microstructures of several commercially-available SiC whisker types have been characterized by high resolution TEM and surface analysis techniques. Results of the characterization of one manufacturer's whiskers, Tateho Chemical Industries, are described in this paper.


2008 ◽  
Vol 368-372 ◽  
pp. 831-833
Author(s):  
Chang Hong Dai ◽  
Zu Wei Song ◽  
Ru Zhao

A new heating apparatus for synthesizing SiC whiskers was introduced. SiC whiskers were synthesized in electric field furnace with carbon black and SiO2 powders as raw materials and some influencing factors were discussed. SiC whiskers with diameter of 0.1-0.4μm, length of 5-70μm and average purity of 99.6% were acquired at lower temperatures of 1200-1400°C for a shorter holding time of 2-4h. The results showed that the high voltage field has great catalysis action on synthetic of SiC whiskers by reducing activation energy and enhancing reaction speed.


1988 ◽  
Vol 110 (3) ◽  
pp. 434-438 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. Ishigaki ◽  
R. Nagata ◽  
M. Iwasa ◽  
N. Tamari ◽  
I. Kondo

The friction and wear characteristics of SiC whisker containing composite silicon nitride were studied. Silicon nitride powder which contains densification aids of Y2O3 and La2O3 was mixed with silicon carbide whiskers (10, 20, and 30 wt percent) and then hot-pressed at a temperature of 1800° C. Wear experiments were carried out with a ring on block type apparatus at the sliding conditions of the sliding speed of 314 mm/sec and the load of 5 N and experimental results showed that the SiC whisker had an evident effect to reduce the wear rate of silicon nitride blocks. Silicon carbide whiskers are not dispersed isotropically, but they are oriented to the direction which is perpendicular to the pressure of hot-press sintering. Therefore, wear characteristics of the composite ceramics are anisotropic. The effect of SiC whisker on wear rate of silicon nitride is larger for the surface which is perpendicular to the direction of pressure of hot-press sintering that than that for the surface which is parallel to the pressure. Although SiC whiskers have no evident effect on friction coefficient of silicon nitride at the above sliding condition, even small contents of SiC whiskers, such as 10 wt percent, reduce considerably the coefficient of friction and show similar frictional characteristics to that of monolithic silicon carbide at the lower sliding speed of 10 mm/min.


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