Structural characterization of a coarsegrained transparent silicon carbide powder by a combination of powder diffraction techniques

Diffraction of hard synchrotron radiation as well as constant-wavelength and time-of-flight neutron diffraction were used for the structural characterization of a silicon carbide powder having extremely low levels of chemical impurities, high perfection of the crystalline lattice and a grain size of up to 150 μm. The presence of three polytypes was ascertained and the ratios of their mass fractions were determined to be w _15R: w _6H = 0.002,3(8) and w _4H: w _6H = 0.000,6(2).