EFFECT OF NICKEL CONTENT ON THE FORMATION AND PROPERTIES OF AMORPHOUSAL100-XRE5NIX ALLOYS

The thermal stability and formation range of amorphous Al(100-x)Ln(5)N i(x) (x = 3, 5, 9, 13, 17, 21, 23) alloys were studied by differential scanning calorimetry and X-ray diffraction techniques. The microhardn ess, H-v, of these Al-RE-Ni alloys was measured. The experimental resu lts show that toughness was adversely affected by increase in the nick el content. The atomic size factor was applied to explain the formatio n mechanism of aluminium-based amorphous alloys by the atomic clusters model. The minimum concentration of nickel in Al-RE-Ni alloys results from the effective atomic volume difference of the nickel and alumini um atoms.