The present work is devoted to the development of Fe-(B-Si)-Zr amorphous alloys with high glass-forming ability and good magnetic properties. Using the cluster-plus-glue-atom model proposed for ideal amorphous structures, [FeFe11B3Si](Fe1-xZrx) was determined as the cluster formula of Fe-(B-Si)-Zr alloys. The glass formation and thermal stability of the serial alloys, namely, [FeFe11B3Si](Fe1-xZrx) (x = 0, 0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5, 0.6, 0.75, and 1.0), were studied by the combination of copper mold casting, X-ray diffraction, and differential thermal analysis techniques. The maxima of glass-forming ability and thermal stability were found to occur at the compositions of [FeFe11B3Si](Fe0.6Zr0.4 ) and [FeFe11B3Si](Fe0.5Z0.5 ). The alloys can be cast into amorphous rods with 1.5 mm diameter, and upon reheating, the amorphous alloys exhibit a large undercooled liquid span of 37 K. The saturation magnetization of the [FeFe11B3Si](Fe0.5Zr0.5) amorphous alloy was measured to be 1.4 T.
Six series of alloys,namely,Ni3Zr6Alx,Ni3Zr7Alx,Ni4Zr9Alx,Ni3Zr8Alx,Ni3Zr9Alx and Ni3Zr10Alx (x=1,1.5,2,3) were designed in this work and the bulk metallic glass (BMG) formation of these compositions was investigated by copper mold suction casting. A centimeter-scale BMG sample was obtained for the Ni4Zr9Al2 (Al13.3Ni26.7Zr60 in atomic percent) composition. The thermal glass parameters for this BMG were determined to be ΔTx = 68 K,Trg = 0.579,and γm = 0.689. Using the 'cluster-resonance' model for glass formation an optimal BMG composition was determined using the cluster formula [Ni3Zr9](Al2Ni1).
LI FengWei QIANG JianBing WANG YingMin WANG Qing DONG XingLong DONG Chuang
