Particle-size, size distribution and dislocations in nanocrystalline tungsten-carbide

Abstract

Ball-milled WC powder has been compacted and sintered. The particle size has been determined by transmission and scanning electron microscopy and high resolution X-ray diffraction. The X-ray diffraction profiles were evaluated for particle size and dislocation densities by the recently developed procedures of modified Williamson-Hall plot and modified Warren-Averbach method. Log-normal particle size distributions have been obtained by a newly developed numerical method from the size parameters provided by X-ray line profile analysis. The size distributions obtained by TEM and X-rays are compared and discussed. The dislocation density was found to be 1.9 × 10 17 m −2 in the ball-milled powder which decreases to 2.0 × 10 15 m −2 after annealing.