Densification silicon nitrides

In the area of preceramic polysilazanes, sufficient progress has been made to produce precursors for silicon nitride fibers, coatings and as binders for silicon nitride powder. However, particular problems still remain to be solved particularly with regard to reducing impurity levels and improving densification during pyrolysis. 

Table 10 summarises all methods for the densification of Si3N4 used at present. The resulting Si3N4 ceramics classified according to the densification routes are also listed together with several remarks on manufacturing characteristics, properties and applications. For comparison with the sintered qualities, information on reaction bonded silicon nitride ceramics are also included but will be treated in more detail in Sect. 8. 

Silicon nitride is a highly covalent bonded compound with self-diffusion coefficient of the nitrogen atoms of 6.3 x 10 2(1 cm2/s at 1400°C.22 Therefore, densification without any sintering additives is nearly impossible. In 1961, Deeley and Herbert.23 was the first to report that Si3N4 ceramics could be... 

A new type of liquid-phase sintered SiC using yttria [1314-36-9J, Y20, as the oxide additive and submicrometer SiC powder for enhanced densification, produces a material which can be densified without the application of pressure (13). This material, sintered from cold isostatically pressed billets, appears to be comparable to silicon nitride in strength and fracture toughness. 

Dense silicon nitride materials are not monophase materials because, for densification, additives, which remain as an amorphous or partially crystallised grain-boundary phase in the material, are necessary (see Section 6.3). 

The pressureless sintering method commonly used for the fabrication of monolithic silicon nitride ceramics cannot be successfully adapted for the fabrication of SiC fiber reinforced silicon nitride matrix composites because of significant strength degradation of currently available fibers at the high temperatures requir l for sintering, and also because of the problems associated with retardation of densification of the matrix material by the... 

A low cost-high performance silicon nitride-BAS composite can be fabricated via pressureless sintering. In this composite, the BAS glass-ceramic serves as an effective liquid-phase-sintering aid, to attain full densification and complete the a-(3 Si,iN4 phase transformation, and remains as a structural matrix that is reinforced by the silicon nitride whiskers, Si3N4 whiskers grow in random directions in a near completely crystallized matrix of hex-acelsian BAS. 

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