Deformation Mechanisms and Fracture of Ni-Based Metallic Glasses

The cracking of materials and fracture surface is of great practical and academic importance. Over the last few years the development of the fractography of crystalline alloys resulted in a useful tool for the prediction or failure analysis. Many attempts have been made to observe cracks using optical microscopy, X-ray topography and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Of these techniques, the resolution of optical microscopy and X-ray topography is too poor. By contrast, the resolution of TEM is high enough for detailed information to be obtained. However, in order to apply TEM observations, a thin foil specimen must be prepared, and it is usually extremely difficult to prepare such a specimen from a pre-selected region containing a crack. In the present work, deformation mechanisms fracture surfaces of Ni-based metallic glass samples have been studied by specially designed experiments. In order to study the deformation mechanisms and fracture the Ni-based metallic glasses have been investigated in the tensile test. The structure and fracture surfaces after the decohesion process in tensile tests were observed using transmission electron microscope (TEM) and scanning electron microscope (SEM), respectively. The studies of structure were performed on thin foils. Moreover the investigated tape was subjected to a banding test. Then, the tape was straightened and the thin foil from the area of maximum strain was prepared. This thin foil sample was deformed before the TEM investigation to obtain local tears.