Achieving tailorable nano-crystallization in a fully amorphous Zr50Cu42Al8 alloy

Abstract

In this work, Zr50Cu42Al8 alloy was rapidly quenched into as-cast rod with nano-glass microstructure and fully amorphous as-spun ribbon, respectively. The different microstructure between the as-cast rod and as-spun ribbon results in the different glass transition, crystallization temperatures and their kinetics. The continuous heating transition (CHT) curves of the as-cast rod and as-spun ribbon derived from their heating rate dependence of onset crystallization temperature imply that the partial nano-crystallization stabilizes the amorphous remainders in the Zr50Cu42Al8 rod when annealed below ∼ 757 K, and give rise to the possibility to obtain nano-crystallization by annealing the fully amorphous ribbons within the temperature interval between the two CHT curves. It is as expected that the ribbons annealed at 730 K for 678 second and at 720 K for 3644 second respectively show similar microstructure and thermal properties to the as-cast rod. The results provide a valid way to achieve tailorable nano-crystallization in the fully amorphous alloys.