A New Rapid Route for In Situ Synthesizing Monolithic TiB Ceramic

Fine-grained monolithic TiB ceramics were successfully in situ synthesized by spark plasma sintering (SPS) technique at temperatures of 1150 degrees-1450 degrees C and a pressure of 50 MPa, using Ti and TiB(2) as reactants. Mechanical properties and densification behavior of the TiB ceramics were investigated. The results indicate that TiB ceramic sintered at 1450 degrees C provide the optimal combination of dense microstructure and excellent properties, including the relative density of 98.2%, the microhardness of 21.2 +/- 1.8 GPa, the flexural strength of 548 +/- 45 MPa and the fracture toughness of 5.9 +/- 0.4 MPa.m(1/2). The dense and fine-grained microstructures are the main factors to improve the mechanical properties of the TiB ceramic synthesized by SPS process.