Mechanical characteristic of spark plasma sintered composite material using carbonized bagasse and Ti Powder

Bagasse is a by-product obtained from squeezed sugar cane. In this study, composite materials were fabricated from powder mixtures of carbonized bagasse and Ti, using spark plasma sintering (SPS). This achieves effective use of bagasse and mechanical strength improvement of carbon ceramics. TiC was synthesized by a chemical reaction between the carbon in carbonized bagasse and Ti powder during SPS. The flexural strength of the composite material fabricated by SPS was maximum at a Ti content of 1 vol.%, and decreased with increasing Ti content above 1 vol.%. The flexural strength of the composite material containing 3 vol.% Ti powder was significantly lower than that of the composite containing 1 vol.% Ti powder. Next, the mechanical properties of the composite materials were investigated using the finite element method (FEM) to examine crack propagation. FEM result suggests that crack coalescence in the composite material occurs during flexural deformation, because of the decrease in the distance between TiC particles as a result of the increased Ti content of the composite material. © 2015, Journal of the Japan Society of Powder and Powder Metallurgy. All rights reserved.