NUMERICAL-SIMULATION OF GRAIN-GROWTH IN LIQUID-PHASE SINTERED MATERIALS - II - STUDY OF ISOTROPIC GRAIN-GROWTH

The Potts model was used to study grain growth in liquid phase sintere d materials. Its application to the study of isotropic grain growth by Ostwald ripening in a fully wetting system will be presented. The int erpretation of the simulation results will be described and discussed. It was found that the set of simulation parameters used gave diffusio n-controlled grain growth for solid fraction ranging from 0.30 to 0.90 . The grain size distribution varied with solid fraction, becoming bro ader and more peaked with increasing solid fraction. The skewness was near zero at solid fraction of 0.41 and shifted to larger grain sizes with increasing solid fraction. This shift in the skewness of grain si ze distribution is not predicted by previous analytical or numerical m odels; however, it is consistent with experimental data collected by F ang and Patterson [Acta metall., 1993, 41, 2017] in the W-Ni-Fe system . (C) 1998 Acta Metallurgica Inc.