Low temperature sintering of SiC using an aluminum borocarbide additive

Abstract

Application of Al8B4C7 as a sintering additive of SiC was performed. Al8B4C7 was synthesized by calcining stoichiometric mixture of aluminum, B4C and carbon at 1800 oC for 2 h in Ar. The additive could be easily crushed into fine powder, and the powder did not have high reactivity with humidity. The densification of SiC was attained by spark plasma sintering at and above 1600oC for 20 min under 80 MPa pressure. Al8B4C7 was an efficient sintering additive of SiC.