Spark plasma sintering behavior of combustion-synthesized (Y, Ca)-α-SiAlON

This paper describes the sintering behavior of combustion-synthesized (Y, Ca)-α-SiAlON powders when using spark plasma sintering (SPS) technology. The effects of sintering temperature, heating rate, and holding time on the densification behavior, α→β phase transformation, and Vickers hardness were investigated in detail. Fully dense Y-α-Si12−(m+n)Alm+nOnN16−n (m=1.2, n=0.6, Y-α-SiAlON) and Ca-α-Si12−(m+n)Alm+nOnN16−n (m=1.0, n=0.5, Ca-α-SiAlON) were obtained during sintering for 10 min at final temperatures as low as 1400 °C and 1500 °C, respectively. X-ray diffraction results showed that more than 50 mass% of α-phase transformed to the β-phase for Y-α-SiAlON after SPS, whereas no obvious α→β phase transformation was observed for Ca-α-SiAlON, even after sintering at a high temperature of 1600 °C. A maximum Vickers hardness of 18.56 GPa and 19.95 GPa was reached for Y-α-SiAlON and Ca-α-SiAlON, respectively.