preparation of titanium diboride tib2 by spark plasma sintering at slow heating rate

A systematic study of the spark plasma sintering of TiB2 starting from mixture of elemental powders was performed to investigate the temperature distribution between pressing tool and sinter body. The reaction mechanism and time-dependant evolution of the sintering behavior are established. The simultaneous application of pulsed high dc current and load leads to a microstructure with needle-shaped grains. Electron backscattering diffraction analyses show the preferred orientation of small crystallites parallel to the pressing direction.