Mechanical Properties of Nanolaminate Ti3SnC2 Carbide Determined by Nanohardness Cartography

Nanoindentation is used to measure hardness of Ti3SnC2, a recently synthesized nanolaminate carbide. Hardness cartography and optical microscopy are used to correlate hardness values and sample phases. An indentation size effect is observed, and a bulk hardness of 9.3 GPa is deduced for Ti3SnC2. Such a value is higher than most of hardness values reported for other nanolaminate carbides and nitrides. It is shown that an underestimation of the nanolaminate carbide hardness values likely results from the effect of grain boundaries.