Preparation of Ti3SiC2 with Aluminum by Means of Spark Plasma Sintering

Polycrystalline bulk Ti3SiC2 material with a high purity and density was fabricated by spark plasma sintering from the elemental powder mixture with starting composition of Ti3Si3Si1-xAlxC2 , where x = 0. 05 -0.2. X-ray diffraction patterns and scanning electron microscopy photographs of the fully dense samples show that a proper addition of aluminum promotes the formation, and accelerates the crystal growth rate of Ti3SIC2, conse-quently results in a high purity of the prepared samples. The synthesized Ti3 SiC2 is in plane-shape with a size of about 10- 25μm in the elongated dimension. Solid solution of aluminum decreases the thermal stability of Ti3SiC2, and lowers the temperature of Ti3SiC2 decomposeing to be 1300 ℃ .