Crystallography of Zr poisoning of Al-Ti-B grain refinement using edge-to-edge matching model

The mechanism of zirconium poisoning on the grain-refining efficiency of an Al-Ti-B based grain refiner was studied. The experiment was conducted by melting Al-5Ti-1B and Al-3Zr master alloys together. The edge-to-edge matching model was used to investigate and compare the orientation relationships between the binary intermetallic compounds present in the Al-Ti-B-Zr system. The results show that the poisoning effect probably results from the combination of Al3Zr with Al3Ti and the decreased amount of Ti solute, for Al3Ti particles have good crystallographic relationships with Al3Zr. Totally six orientation relationships may present between them, while they play vital roles in grain refinement. TiB2 particles appear to remain unchanged because of a bit large misfit. Only one orientation relationship may present between them to prevent Al3Zr phase from forming on the surface of TiB2, though TiB2 is agglomerated. The theoretical calculation agrees well with the experimental results. The edge-to-edge matching model is proved to be a useful tool for discovering the orientation relationships between phases.