Research Progress in MAX Phase Ti3SiC2 Highly Conductive Coating

Ti3SiC2(TSC) is a new type of ternary compound MAX phase with excellent properties of both metallic and ceramic materials. Ti3SiC2 as a high conductive coating with great application potential has attracted more and more attention in recent years. The preparation technologies of Ti3SiC2 coating are constantly being reformed and optimized. There're mainly five common processes to prepare Ti3SiC2 coating, including chemical vapor deposition (CVD), physical vapor deposition (PVD), solid-state reaction, aerosol deposition method (ADM) and thermal sp-raying, respectively. The properties of Ti3SiC2 coatings are closely related to their purity to a large extent. Usually, a certain degree of impurities are contained in Ti3SiC2 coating, which has become an important factor restricting its wide application. It is found that the impurities in Ti3SiC2 coating are mainly TiC, Ti5Si3, SiC, TiSi2, etc. More over, the kinds of impurities produced by different methods are different. In order to improve the purity of Ti3SiC2 coating, it is necessary to explore and optimize the preparation process. At present, reactive chemical vapor deposition (RCVD) has realized the growth of pure Ti3SiC2 coating on graphite substrate by consuming silicon carbide (SiC) sublayer. Besides, ADM has also produced pure Ti3SiC2 coatings at room temperature, which reduces the synthesis temperature of conventional Ti3SiC2 coating. In addition, PVD technology not only provides the possibility of synthesizing Ti3SiC2 coating at low temperature, but also realizes the industrial production of Ti-Si-C composite coating. This paper comprehensively reviews the recent research on Ti3SiC2. The unique crystal structure and excellent properties of Ti3SiC2 coating are discussed. The different ways to prepare Ti3SiC2 coating were analyzed and current challenges in the synthesis of pure Ti3SiC2 coating were also introduced. Furthermore, the current and potential applications of Ti3SiC2 coating has been summarized. Overall, the analyses and discussions of various Ti3SiC2 coating synthesis technologies in this review will be contributed to synthesis of high purity Ti3SiC2 coating in the future. © 2021, Materials Review Magazine. All right reserved.