An Analysis of the Grain Refinement of Magnesium by Zirconium

Abstract

A Design of Experiments approach was used to conduct a systematic study of the grain refinement of magnesium by zirconium; variables included the amount of zirconium, the pouring temperature, and the settling time prior to casting, Optical microscopy was used to measure the grain size, TEM was used to identify particles that are likely nucleation sites, The TEM results show that a range of particle sizes are likely substrates and that particles which are likely nucleation sites are faceted, Sample dissolution followed by SEM was used to characterize particle size and morphology while an AccuSizer 770 was used to measure particle size distributions, both in the master alloy and grain refined samples, While less than 2% of the total particles serve as nucleation sites, a comparison of the grain density vs, faceted particle density shows close agreement, suggesting that only faceted particles are likely nucleation sites, Introduction