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This paper reports for the very first time a facile and simple method, consisting of simultaneous centrifugal spinning and solution blowing, to mass produce ceramic fibres from preceramic polymers. Solutions of two different commercially available silicone resins and a mixture of a silicone resin and graphene were used, and a polymer (polyvynilpyrolidone) was added to aid the fibre generation process. The fibre diameter and the morphology of the spun and the pyrolysed fibres were shown to be influenced by rotating speed, working pressure and the polymer concentration. Non-porous fibres were obtained using a low volatility binary solvent system and, after pyrolysis at high temperature, dense SiOC ceramic fibre bundles were produced. This fabrication method based on pressurised gyration shows great promise in the mass production of ceramic fibre bundles.

In this work we manufactured micro-sized SiOC ceramic components by 3D printing (Direct Ink Writing) of a preceramic polymer. Model porous ceramic scaffolds with the lateral dimension of a few millimeters and composed of a continuous ceramic filament ∼120 μm thick were produced, and a suitable rheological behavior was obtained by mixing cross-linked preceramic particles with a siloxane resin dissolved in a solvent. The addition of a low amount (0.025–0.1 wt%) of graphene oxide to the ink formulation further improves the structural stability during pyrolysis reducing the shrinkage of the preceramic polymer. Upon pyrolysis at low temperature (1000 °C), graphene oxide converted into graphene. The resulting scaffolds possess a good compression strength, of ∼2.5 MPa for a total porosity of ∼64 vol% (∼3.1 MPa after the addition of 0.1 wt% graphene oxide).