Calculation of thermal expansion coefficient of Fe/sub 3/Al with the addition of transition metal elements

Abstract

The addition of transition metal elements can significantly modify physical properties of intermetalic compounds. We studied the influence of Molybdenum and Vanadium additives on thermal expansion coefficient (CTE) of Fe/sub 3/Al and FeAl over the wide range of temperatures. The site preference of both transition metals was determined by full-potential LMTO method within the grandcanonical formalism. At low temperatures CTEs were found directly from the FP-LMTO calculations by incorporating them into the Debye model of a solid. The obtained thermal expansion for pure Fe/sub 3/Al and FeAl is within 10% of its experimentally measured values. At high temperatures we performed molecular dynamics simulations based on our many-body atomistic potentials. The parameters were fitted to reproduce the total energy of a crystal under various types of deformations obtained by FP-LMTO method and were tested with respect to different structures and vacancy formation energies. Our calculations show that addition of V decreases the CTEs of both iron-aluminides, while the addition of Mo makes Fe/sub 3/Al DO3 structure unstable.