Electromagnetic forming of metallic glasses using capacitive discharge and magnetic field

• Main Authors: DEMETRIOU MARIOS D, ROBERT SCOTT N, JOHNSON WILLIAM L, KALTENBOECK GEORG, SAMWER KONRAD
• Format: Patent
• Language: Chinese; English
• Published: 03.09.2014
• Subjects: ALLOYS; CHANGING THE PHYSICAL STRUCTURE OF NON-FERROUS METALS ANDNON-FERROUS ALLOYS; CHEMISTRY; FERROUS OR NON-FERROUS ALLOYS; GENERAL DEVICES FOR HEAT TREATMENT OF FERROUS OR NON-FERROUSMETALS OR ALLOYS; MAKING METAL MALLEABLE BY DECARBURISATION, TEMPERING OR OTHERTREATMENTS; MECHANICAL METAL-WORKING WITHOUT ESSENTIALLY REMOVINGMATERIAL; METALLURGY; METALLURGY OF IRON; MODIFYING THE PHYSICAL STRUCTURE OF FERROUS METALS; PERFORMING OPERATIONS; PUNCHING METAL; TRANSPORTING; TREATMENT OF ALLOYS OR NON-FERROUS METALS; WORKING OR PROCESSING OF SHEET METAL OR METAL TUBES, RODS ORPROFILES WITHOUT ESSENTIALLY REMOVING MATERIAL

An apparatus and method of uniformly heating, rheologically softening, and thermoplastically forming metallic glasses rapidly into a net shape using a rapid capacitor discharge forming (RCDF) tool in combination with an electromagnetic force generated by the interaction of the applied current with a transverse magnetic field. The RCDF method utilizes the discharge of electrical energy stored in a capacitor to uniformly and rapidly heat a sample or charge of metallic glass alloy to a predetermined "process temperature" between the glass transition temperature of the amorphous metal and the equilibrium melting point of the alloy in a time scale of several milliseconds or less, at which point the interaction between the electric field and the magnetic field generates a force capable of shaping the heated sample into a high quality amorphous bulk article via any number of techniques including, for example, injection molding, dynamic forging, stamp forging, and blow molding in a time scale of less than one second.