Glass-forming ability and crystallization behavior of some binary and ternary Ni-based glassy alloys

The purpose of the current paper is to study the influence of Ti, V, Nb, Al, Sn and Pd additions on the glass-forming ability, formation of a supercooled liquid region and a devitrification process of some Ni-Zr glassy alloys as well as to compare the results with those obtained for similar Cu-based alloys studied earlier. The Ni-based glassy alloys were investigated by using X-ray diffraction, differential scanning and isothermal calorimetries. Although the studied Ni-based alloys showed high values of the reduced glass-transition temperature of about 0.6, their glass-forming ability is quite low. This fact may be explained by low stability of the supercooled liquid against crystallization and formation of the equilibrium intermetallic compounds with a high growth rate compared to those observed in similar Cu-based alloys studied earlier. Relatively low thermal conductivity of Ni-based alloys is also found to be another factor limiting their glass-forming ability.