TiB whiskers reinforced high temperature titanium Ti60 alloy composites with novel network microstructure

• High temperature titanium Ti60 alloy is used to fabricate TiBw/Ti60 composites.
• TiBw/Ti60 composites with network microstructure are successfully fabricated by RHP.
• The tensile strength of 8 vol.% TiBw/Ti60 composites is increased by 61.1% at 600 °C.
• High temperature strengthening effect of grain boundary is exploited.

TiB whiskers reinforced high temperature titanium Ti60 alloy (TiBw/Ti60) composites with a novel network microstructure have been successfully fabricated by the system of large spherical Ti60 powders and fine TiB2 powders. The results show that the minimum temperature fabricating the composites by reaction hot pressing (RHP) is established to be 1300 °C due to usage of high temperature titanium Ti60 alloy. The TiB whiskers are in situ synthesized around large Ti60 matrix particles and then formed a novel three-dimensional (3D) network microstructure. The tensile strength of 8 vol.% TiBw/Ti60 composites with a network microstructure is increased by 61.1%, 57.4% and 45.5% compared with that of the monolithic Ti60 alloy at 600 °C, 700 °C and 800 °C, respectively. The superior improvement can be mainly attributed to the network microstructure, grain refinement and usage of large spherical Ti60 powders.