Silicon Carbide Powder

Washington Mills provides CARBOREX(r) products in various chemistries and sizes for high precision lapping and polishing operations, as well as for use with bonded/coated abrasives or pressure blasting applications.

Silicon carbide (commonly referred to as Carborundum) is one of the hardest materials available and often found in products requiring high durability such as automobile brakes and clutches, bulletproof vests and bullet-resistant clothing.

Hardness

Silicon Carbide is one of the hardest materials known to man, ranking second only to diamond on Mohs’ scale of hardness – surpassing even tungsten carbide’s hardness rating! Refractory materials made of silicon carbide can withstand extremely high temperatures while being used for grinding, cutting and blasting operations.

Silicon carbide (SiC) is an industrial mineral crystalline silicate compound composed of silicon (Si) and carbon (C). It is one of the two most prevalent industrial mineral silicates after corundum. Silicon carbide production involves heating silica sand mixed with petroleum coke carbon to high temperatures in an electric resistance type furnace to form green and black-colored crystal structures; green colored silicon carbide generally having lower levels of impurities than its black-colored counterpart.

Green silicon carbide boasts superior abrasive and cutting properties, making it an ideal material for grinding low tensile strength materials like glass, stone and non-ferrous metals. Green SiC is also highly resistant to chemical oxidation while maintaining strength at elevated temperatures.

Bayville’s Green Silicon Carbide comes in standard FEPA grit sizes as well as custom particle sizes, densities and chemistries to meet specific project needs. Furthermore, Bayville also provides reactively bonded silicon carbide which involves mixing SiC powder with resin or vitrified points and wheels in order to form the desired shape.

Thermal Conductivity

Silicon Carbide (SiC) is an inorganic chemical compound composed of silicon and carbon, used as a semiconductor with high voltage resistance. SiC finds application both as an abrasive material and electrical insulation due to its superior wear resistance, chemical inertness, thermal conductivity and strength at elevated temperatures.

SiC is typically produced as either powder or large crystals through sintering, while ceramic forms produced using this process are used in applications requiring high endurance such as automobile brakes and clutches or bulletproof vests, among others. SiC also finds applications as electronic components like light-emitting diodes that require high current tolerance as well as temperature tolerance tolerances.

Electron microscopy reveals a crystalline material called Ceria. Its close-packed structure contains two primary coordination tetrahedra of four carbon and four silicon atoms bonded together – these four-carbon/four silicon bonds prevent its insoluble dissolution into water, alcohol and most organic acids (except hydrofluoric acid and its fluorides ). Ceria is resistant to most inorganic acids and salts except hydrofluoric acid and its fluorides which corrode its surface.

SiC can be studied using glow discharge mass spectrometry (GD-MS), X-ray diffraction and inductively coupled plasma-optical emission spectroscopy/electron energy dispersive spectroscopy. SEM-EDS allows uncalibrated semiquantitative element mapping capabilities. SiC’s chemical composition can also be affected by its environment so it is essential that we gain an understanding of how this material behaves throughout its synthesis and manufacture processes.

Electrical Conductivity

Silicon carbide in its pure state is an electrical insulator; however, when doped with impurities (known as doping), it becomes semi-conducting. Doping allows it to conduct current more efficiently than silicon, which has a bandgap which is almost three times smaller. Therefore, SiC is better equipped to withstand the high voltages and temperatures found in electronics applications as well as modern industrial uses.

Doping occurs by adding elements that either accept or donate charge carriers from within a crystal structure. Accepting elements, like nitrogen and phosphorus ions, results in n-type doped silicon carbide material while adding accepting ions like boron or aluminum create p-type doped material. Both n- and p-type silicon carbides exhibit high electrical conductivity with their Seebeck coefficient shifting from negative to positive as soon as 3 and 5mol% doped SiC is introduced into its structure.

Silicon carbide ceramic is one of the toughest non-oxide ceramic materials on earth, boasting an exceptional hardness level between that of fused alumina and synthetic diamond. Resistant to most organic and inorganic acids, salts and alkalis – with the exception of hydrofluoric acid – silicon carbide is both tough and abrasive enough to grind metals at high speeds – thus justifying its widespread usage as an abrasive, as well as being used as an additive for refractories or metalworking operations.

Chemical Resistance

Silicon carbide’s chemical resistance is one of its hallmarks. It remains almost completely resistant to acids (hydrochloric, sulphuric and hydrofluoric), bases (concentrated sodium hydroxide and potassium hydroxide), oxidizing chemicals like nitric acid as well as corrosion from saltwater solutions and most solvents.

Silicon carbide’s excellent chemical purity contributes to its excellent refractory and ceramic properties, making it the ideal material for wafer tray supports and paddles in semiconductor furnaces as well as applications requiring high temperatures, electrical conductivity and electrical conductivity. This makes silicon carbide an excellent choice for applications requiring high temperature resistance with superior electrical conductivity such as in refractory applications requiring electrical conductivity and temperature resistance.

Black silicon carbide, a crystalline substance with hardness falling between fused alumina and synthetic diamond, makes an excellent refractory and abrasive material choice. Produced through melting quartz sand with petroleum coke in an electric resistance type furnace, black silicon carbide can be purchased either in granules, powder or sintered form.

RHI Magnesita produces high-end refractory products from nano silicon carbide powder with particular agglomerates of carbon particles between 50-60nm in primary particle size, offering outstanding chemical and thermal stability, excellent mechanical strength, and extremely high porosity levels. Granules treated with nitrogen under heat and pressure at 1400 degC to convert metallic silicon to silicon nitride produce shrinkage-free materials with open/closed porosities between 10-15% depending on the application.