Mechanical alloying of Al–Cu–Fe elemental powders

The formation of quasicrystalline powders by mechanical alloying of crystalline elemental powders has been investigated for Al70−x(Cu,Fe)30+x (x=0, 5, 7) alloy systems. The alloying process during milling and additional annealing at elevated temperature has been characterized by X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy. It is observed that as x increases, tendency of i-phase formation decreases in these mechanically alloyed powder compositions. The cubic solid solution identified as β-phase is observed to be present as one of the major phases in all the above alloy compositions.