The effect of Ag addition on the crystallization kinetics and glass forming ability of Zr-(CuAg)-Al bulk metallic glass

In this study, the effect of Ag addition on the crystallization kinetics and glass forming ability (GFA) of Zr-(CuAg)-Al based bulk metallic glasses were investigated. X-ray diffraction (XRD) has been used to identify the amorphous nature and crystalline phases of the as cast samples. The crystallization and glass transition kinetics of the as-cast samples have been examined under non-isothermal conditions using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The DSC experiments have been carried out at different heating rates for all the samples. The heating rate dependence of crystallization and glass transition temperatures has been used to evaluate activation energy associate to these processes. In addition to this Avrami exponent has been measured at all heating rate using Various Heating Rate (VHR) method. The GFA and thermal stability of the samples have been investigated using the T_rg, γ and fragility parameters. These parameters were found to be composition dependent, which indicated that among the studied bulk metallic glass systems the sample having 9 at. % Ag possessed maximum thermal stability.