Thermodynamics and constitution of Mg-Al-Ca-Sr-Mn alloys: Part II. Procedure for multicomponent key sample selection and application to the Mg-Al-Ca-Sr and Mg-Al-Ca-Sr-Mn systems

Abstract

A procedure is suggested to identify key sample compositions in n-component alloys, providing the most crucial information with limited experimental effort. The proposed algorithm furthermore establishes the exact type of reaction equation of the (n + 1) phase invariant equilibria. Predictive calculations of phase equilibria in quaternary Mg-Al-Ca-Sr and quinary Mg-Al-Ca-Sr-Mn alloys are performed based on elaborate binary and ternary thermodynamic descriptions. Experimental work, using key samples and Mg-rich alloys, demonstrates the viability of the current approach in validating the predictions. Finally, the impact of using more or less elaborate ternary data is quantitatively exemplified for the quinary system Mg-Al-Ca-Sr-Mn by a comparison of different thermodynamic data sets. © 2009 ASM International.