• Applied Microscopy
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.95-104
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• 1996

A comprehensive methodology to characterize the interfacial reaction products of $SiC_p/2024$ Al composites is introduced on the basis of the experimental results obtained using XRD, SEM and TEM. XRD performed on the electrochemically extracted $SiC_p$ and bulk $SiC_p/2024$ Al composite have shown that the interfacial reaction products consist of $Al_{4}C_3$ having hexagonal crystallographic structure, pure eutectic Si having diamond cubic crystallographic structure, and $CuAl_2$, having tetragonal crystalloraphic structure, respectively. According to the images observed by SEM, $Al_{4}C_3$, which has been reported to have needle shape, has a hexagonal platelet-shape and eutectic Si is found to have a dendritic shape. In addition eutectic $CuAl_2$, was observed to form near interface and/or along the grain boundaries. In order to confirm the results obtained by XRD, the primitive cell volume and reciprocal lattice height of such interfacial reaction products were calculated using the data obtained from convergent beam electron diffraction (CBED) patterns, and then compared with theoretical values.