or laboratory because of the toxic nature of beryllium it should also be noted that beryllium is one of the strategic metals and the sources of obtaining beryllium powder for this purpose are limited which makes the fabrication of a high precision mirror out of beryllium a very expensive undertaking the three methods used according to the teachings of subject invention for fabricating a mirror out of a discontinuous refinforced particulate metal matrix composite mmc material to replace a high precision beryllium mirror prepared according to the process of fig1 is taught by fig2 4 the process of fig2 starts with a metal powder and a ceramic powder which are blended and then consolidated by the conventional process of hot isostatic pressing hip to form a near net shape mirror substrate alternatively a molten metal is mixed with a ceramic powder homogenized and then cast into a near net shape mirror substrate as shown in fig3 fig4 shows that a metal powder and a ceramic powder are blended together and consolidated by vacuum hot pressing vhp then forged into a near net shape mirror substrate it should be noted that the mmc material can be made by methods other than described above without deviating from the teachings of subject invention the steps used after obtaining a near net shape mirror substrate as in the processes shown in fig2 4 are similar in that the near net shape mirror.