Densification of mullite–SiC nanocomposite sol–gel precursors by pressureless sintering

Mullite–SiC nanocomposite has been synthesised based on a nanoprecursor route and sintered to high density through pressureless sintering technique. The approach has been first to evolve a method to obtain high density, fine-grained mullite matrix phase through a sol–gel seeded route. Nanosize SiC particles (∼200 nm) were dispersed in a seeded mullite precursor sol to obtain mullite-coated SiC particles, which were further compacted and sintered to hybrid composites, resulting in distribution of SiC particles at the inter- and intra-mullite grain positions.