The ablation of Sintered Silicon Carbide Ceramics by ArF excimer laser were studied. Three zones are generated: the ablation zone presented molten morphology and composed by Si and C phase; the condensation zone formed by vaporized SiC; the oxidation zone showed the characteristics of thermal oxidation. The ablation depth and oxidation range increase linearly with fluence and pulses within 0.5-4J/cm2, but the normalized ablation efficiency is constant (3.60±0.60). The theoretical photochemical ablation depth supplies 25% of the total depth at 1J/cm2 but decreases to 16% at 4J/cm2. The ablation is dominated by photothermal effect and conforms to thermal evaporation mechanism.
