A new fabrication route, an alternative to glass encapsulated hipping (GEHI
P), has been developed to produce dense TiB2 cermets. Key points of this te
chnique, based on hipping after vacuum sintering (VS + HIP), are the use of
Ni-3(AI,Ti) as binder phase and the selection of the proper amount of addi
tions. The main advantage of VS + HIP with respect to GEHIP is the simplifi
cation of the sintering procedure which avoids the glass encapsulation Step
that makes it more adaptable for industrial use. Successful application of
VS + HIP requires a minimum binder content about 10 vol.-% below which a s
ignificant hardness reduction is observed owing to the presence of residual
porosity as compared with GEHIP. The materials produced by this technique
combine low density and high stiffness with high hardness and toughness val
ues, thus giving a set of properties especially attractive for applications
where inertial loads are responsible for failure.