THE STRUCTURE OF AMORPHOUS AND NANOCRYSTALLINE W-FE ALLOYS PREPARED BY HIGH-ENERGY BALL MILLING

Tungsten powder (99.9% purity, 12 mum particle size) was milled in a hardened steel vial with six 440C stainless steel balls for 1-50 h. Because of the hardness of W, contamination and later alloying with Fe from abrasion of the stainless steel balls occurred. X-ray chemical analysis and weight-gain measurements of the milled powder indicated Fe contents varying from 3 at.% after 1 h to approximately 40 at.% after 50 h milling. The powder pattern peaks of the nanocrystalline W were subjected to a Fourier analysis to determine the effective particle size and the microstrains within these particles. After 20 h milling, a particle size of 35 angstrom and microstrains of 0.5% were observed. The diffraction patterns from the W powder milled for 20 and 50 h were also analyzed in terms of the structure factor (interference function) and the atomic distribution function. The 20 h sample was predominantly nanocrystalline with a broad diffuse peak under the (110) and (211) reflections, while the 50 h sample was predominantly amorphous. After subtracting the remnant crystalline peaks, the position of the first peak in the reduced atomic distribution function, G(I)(r), was found to be 2.7 angstrom.