Abstract
This paper investigates amorphous phase formation and rapid solidification characteristics of a CoCr alloy. High cooling rate and high undercooling-induced rapid solidification of the alloy was achieved by impulse atomization in helium atmosphere. Two atomization experiments were carried out to generate powders of a wide size range from liquid CoCr at two different temperatures. Amorphous fraction and kinetic crystallization properties of impulse atomized powders were systematically quantified by means of differential scanning calorimetry. In addition, different but complementary characterization tools were used to analyze the powders microstructures. The fraction of amorphous phase within the investigated powders is found to be promoted by high cooling rate or smaller powder size. The critical cooling rate for amorphous phase formation, which is influenced by the oxygen content in the melt, is found to be ~3 × 104 K s−1 and corresponds to a 160-µm-diameter powder atomized in helium. Hardness of the powders is found to follow a trend that is described by the Hall–Petch relation when a relatively high fraction of crystalline structures is present and decreases with the fraction of amorphous phase.
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