A. Calvo

Manufacturing of self-passivating tungsten based alloys by different powder metallurgical routes

Self-passivating tungsten based alloys will provide a major safety advantage compared to pure tungsten when used as first wall armor of future fusion reactors, due to the formation of a protective oxide layer which prevents the formation of volatile and radioactive WO3 in case of a loss of coolant accident with simultaneous air ingress. Bulk WCr10Ti2 alloys were manufactured by two different powder metallurgical routes: (1) mechanical alloying (MA) followed by hot isostatic pressing (HIP) of metallic capsules, and (2) MA, compaction, pressureless sintering in H2 and subsequent HIPing without encapsulation. Both routes resulted in fully dense materials with homogeneous microstructure and grain sizes of 300 nm and 1 μm, respectively. The content of impurities remained unchanged after HIP, but it increased after sintering due to binder residue. It was not possible to produce large samples by route (2) due to difficulties in the uniaxial compaction stage. Flexural strength and fracture toughness measured on samples produced by route (1) revealed a ductile-to-brittle-transition temperature (DBTT) of about 950 °C. The strength increased from room temperature to 800 °C, decreasing significantly in the plastic region. An increase of fracture toughness is observed around the DBTT.

Fracture strength testing of a self-passivating tungsten alloy at the micrometre scale

Abstract The brittle fracture strength of a self-passivating W-Cr10-Ti2 alloy (in wt.%) was measured through un-notched cantilever bending at the microscopic scale. The material behaved purely elastic and fractured catastrophically in an unstable fashion. An average nominal strength of 5.9 GPa was measured. The scatter in strength was shown to be significantly higher than the sum of all random errors indicating an inherent variability of the material’s strength. The measurements from 28 tests followed a Weibull distribution with a modulus of m = 12. Results from a size effect study at the microscopic scale were successfully predicted through Weibull scaling. Extrapolation into the macroscopic range overestimated the measured three-point bend strength, which is likely due to the presence of large-scale heterogeneities. The test technique sampled a material thickness of only several micrometres and is hence suitable for future ion irradiation studies.