Abstract
Melt-spun amorphous Fe80Nb10B10 ribbons were subjected to ball milling for different periods. The results show that ball milling not only induces the formation of nano-crystalline α-Fe during milling, but also drastically changes the crystallization behavior of the residual amorphous phase. In contrast to the as-spun ribbon, which crystallizes during heating through the formation of the metastable Nb5Fe33B10 phase and subsequent decomposition into stable α-Fe and a small fraction of Fe2B and NbFeB, ball milling progressively suppresses the formation of Nb5Fe33B10 as primary crystallization product and promotes the formation of α-Fe at low temperatures. The ball-milled nano-crystalline/amorphous powders have a saturation magnetization 2.5–3 times higher than the as-quenched amorphous ribbon along with Curie temperature increase by about 70 K with respect to the parent as-spun material. The structure and related magnetic properties of the milled material do not significantly change in the bulk samples synthesized by powder consolidation at temperatures up to ∼900 K, which indicates that the stable nature of α-Fe makes this nano-crystalline/amorphous composite material potentially suitable for a wide range of high temperature applications.
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