Abstract
Experiments have been conducted to evaluate the potential of the BIGDIFF Debye–Scherrer diffractometer (radius of 573 mm) for characterizing ceramic materials using synchrotron radiation. The instrument has been tested at a wavelength of 0.1538 nm (1.5378), under in vacuo conditions, with standard reference materials and an alumina‐matrix ceramic specimen using capillary‐mounted (diameter of 0.5 mm) powdered material. The diffraction patterns that have been recorded with imaging plates over a period of 15 min provide phase detectability that is clearly superior to Bragg‐Brentano laboratory X‐ray diffractometry data that is collected in 1 h. The superiority of BIGDIFF for the analysis of phase composition becomes very pronounced for trace phases (,1%). The sharper definition of the Bragg peaks with BIGDIFF synchrotron radiation data also leads to improved estimates of nonlinear residual strain and crystallite size data. The superior performance of BIGDIFF is principally due to (i) the intensity of the synchrotron radiation incident beam that is achieved with high collimation and monochromaticity (E/ΔE 104), (ii) the large ratio of the camera radius to the capillary radius, and (iii) the spatial resolution and dynamic range of the imaging plates.
Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
