Diamond/SiC composites are appropriate candidate materials for heat conduction as well as high temperature abrasive materials because they do not form liquid phase at high temperature. Diamond/SiC composite consists of diamond particles embedded in a SiC binding matrix. SiC is a hard material with strong covalent bonds having similar structure and thermal expansion with diamond. Interfacial reaction plays an important role in diamond/SiC composites. Diamond/SiC composites were fabricated by high temperature and high pressure (HPHT) sintering with different diamond content, single diamond particle size and bi-modal diamond particle size, and also the effects of composition of diamond and silicon on microstructure, mechanical properties and thermal properties of diamond/SiC composite were investigated. The critical factors influencing the dynamics of reaction between diamond and silicon, such as graphitization process and phase composition, were characterized. Key factor to enhance mechanical and thermal properties of diamond/SiC composites is to keep strong interfacial bonding at diamond/SiC composites and homogeneous dispersion of diamond particles in SiC matrix.

The microstructure and hardness of (W,Ti)C cemented carbides with a different metallic binder composition of Ni and Co fabricated by powder technology were investigated. The densifications of the prepared materials were accomplished by using vacuum sintering at . Nearly full dense (W,Ti)C cemented carbides were obtained with a relative density of up to 99.7% with 30 wt.% Co and 99.9% with 30 wt.% Ni as a metallic binder. The average grain size of the (W,Ti)C-Co and the (W,Ti)C-Ni was decreased by increasing the metallic binder content. The hardness of the dense (W,Ti)C-15 wt%Co and (W,Ti)C-15 wt%Ni, was greater than that of the other related cemented carbides; in addition, the cobalt-based cemented carbides had greater hardness values than the nickel-based cemented carbides.