Influence of Sintering Additives and Temperature on Fabrication of LPS-SiC

액상소결법에 의한 탄화규소 제조시 소결조제와 온도의 영향

SiC materials have been extensively studied for high temperature components in advanced energy system and advanced gas turbine because it has excellent high temperature strength, low coefficient of thermal expansion, good resistance to oxidation and good thermal and chemical stability etc. However, the brittle characteristics of SiC such as low fracture toughness and low strain-to fracture still impose a severe limitation on practical applications of SiC materials. For these reasons, SiC/SiC composites can be considered as a promising for various structural materials, because of their good fracture toughness compared with monolithic SiC ceramics. But, high temperature and pressure lead to the degradation of the reinforcing jiber during the hot pressing. Therefore, reduction of sintering temperature and pressure is key requirements for the fabrication of SiC/SiC composites by hot pressing method. In the present work, monolithic Liquid Phase Sintered SiC (LPS-SiC) was fabricated by hot pressing method in Ar atmosphere at $1800^{\circ}C$ under 20MPa using $Al_2O_3,\;Y_2O_3\;and\;SiO_2$ as sintering additives in order to low sintering temperature and sintering pressure. The starting powder was high purity $\beta-SiC$ nano-powder with all average particle size of 30mm. The characterization of LPS-SiC was investigated by means of SEM and three point bending test. Base on the composition of sintering additives-, microstructure- and mechanical property correlation, tire compositions of sintering additives are discussed.