Determination of the crystallographic texture of sintered PrFeB magnets based on X-ray diffraction patterns

An alternative method for determining the degree of crystallographic alignment (cos Θ) of the magnetic Pr₂Fe₁₄B phase (Φ) is proposed. The method is based on the relative X-ray diffracted intensities of the Φ planes of sintered magnets with and without texture. The degree of crystallographic alignment is also determined by X-ray pole figures using the (0 0 4) reflection and considered as a standard reference for comparison. The method is applied to Pr₁₆Fe₇₆B₈ magnets with 0.51cos Θ0.97. The difference between the crystallographic alignments determined by these two methods is 3% within the experimental error. The advantages and limitations of using X-ray diffraction patterns to quantitatively evaluate the texture of sintered magnets are also discussed.