High temperature X-ray diffraction investigation of an aluminium-silicon- corundum system

Abstract

All aluminium products come from melting processes. At the melting temperature, aluminium and its alloys are highly reactive with the metals and the refractories which line the furnace inside. Investigation of interactions of aluminium and its alloys with the refrac- tory materials upon heating is therefore an issue. In this paper this investigation is focused on the model system made of aluminium-silicon mixture at eutectic composition and corundum. In particular, the structural and microstructural features are investigated by high-temperature resolved X-ray diffraction (HTXRD) and bidimensional micro X-Ray diffraction (XRD 2 ). During cooling we followed the crystallization of aluminium and silicon and few single crystallites of a new phase, possibly related to Al19Fe5Si2, were detected by microXRD 2 .