Magnesiothermic Reduction Synthesis of Silicon Carbide with Varying Temperatures: Structural and Mechanical Features

Abstract

The search for finding effective ways to produce high quality of nanostructured materials have always been the never-ending work of many scientists and engineers from time to time. Important issues to address are reducing fabrication expense and lowering energy utilization to complete the synthesis. A specific circumstance is an investigation of using relatively low temperature to fabricate pure silicon carbide (SiC), one of the most notable materials due to its excellent properties, from naturally appearing minerals. In this current study, silicon carbide was prepared by means of magnesiothermic approach at some adjusting temperatures using argon gas furnace. The source of silicon and carbon were respectively initiated from naturally purified silica and sucrose. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) assessment clearly uncovered the pure moissanite-3c phase of silicon carbide, having a cubic crystal structure. The disappearing of magnesium, otherwise in the form of magnesium oxide, was also validated by the X-ray fluorescence (XRF) test. Furthermore, the chemical functional groups were clarified by Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, and the silicon-carbide interaction was evidently detected from the FTIR spectrum. Besides, the SiC products exhibited high Vickers hardness values, nearly 150 MPa for the sample with temperature synthesis of 800 °C.