The elongation percentage of the unreinforced pure nickel and Ni–SiCNP composites were obtained through tensile testing at room temperature. The corresponding results are shown in Fig. 9. It can be seen that the elongation percentage of the unreinforced pure nickel reaches 31.7%. In contrast to the unreinforced pure nickel, the elongation percentages of the Ni–SiCNP composites significantly decrease (∼11.2%), especially when milled for 48 h. The elongation percentages also decrease with increasing of milling time