Fig. 5. Compared with the
Si/G¼1/8 sample, the amount of SiC coating formation clearly
increased at higher Si/G molar ratios. The magnified SEM image
(Fig. 5B and C), further shows that the higher areas of graphite
flakes were coated by SiC crystals. In fact, more Si is present on the
higher Si/G ratio sample and converted to β-SiC, indicating that
the coating areas were most likely increased. In addition, some
fibres with a high aspect ratio (length/diameter) were also observed
in the heat-treated sample (indicated by the white arrow in
Fig. 5D). EDS analysis used to identify the composition of these
fibres revealed that these fibres were SiC.