Nanostructure of Dispersed and Compact Nonstoichiometric Vanadium Carbide

Structure and properties of dispersed and compact nanocrystalline vanadium carbide VC0.875 were studied. Dispersed vanadium nanocarbide was prepared by prolonged aging of a coarse-grained VC0.875 powder. It has a unique nanostructure: nanocrystallites of dispersed vanadium carbide have a shape of bent lobes up to 600 nm in diameter and 15-20 nm thick. Annealing and quenching of compact samples of coarsegrained VC0.875 carbide result in the formation of a nanodomain structure. The nanostructured carbide VC0.875 corresponds in composition to the higher boundary of a homogeneity area of a cubic phase and mainly contains ordered V8C7 phase, which belongs to the P4₃32 space group. Cold pressing and subsequent vacuum sintering of vanadium carbide nanopowder at 2000 K gave sintered samples approaching diamond in microhardness.