Pressure effect on grain boundary wetting at various temperatures

Bicrystals of Fe-6 at.% Si alloy containing <001> 5 tilt grain boundaries with a deposited zinc layer have been annealed at various hydrostatic pressure at four temperatures between 700° and 905°C. After the anneals the dihedral angle of the grain boundary groove formed at the site of the grain boundary intersection with the solid-melt interphase boundary has been measured. The transition from complete to incomplete wetting of the grain boundary by the zinc-rich melt (dewetting phase transition) has been found to occur as the pressure increased at all temperatures studied. The temperature dependence of the dewetting transition pressure p_whas been determined. That dependence has a minimum at a temperature of 790°C, which is close to the peritectic temperature in the Fe–Zn system (782°C). A thermodynamic analysis of the wetting phenomena in the two-component system, based on Becker's regular solution model for the surface tension of the interphase boundary, explains the minimum in the p_w(T) dependence.