Ball milling criteria for producing nano intermetallic compounds

Abstract The effect of milling time and melting point of the powder materials on the evolution of grain size to the nanometre regime in intermetallic compounds was modelled and analysed by means of artificial neural network. The critical parameters of the milling process, namely, time to reach the 100 nm crystallite size, effective milling time, and crystallite size at this stage, were determined from this model. These criteria are important from the practical standpoint. Moreover, a relation between the effective crystallite size and the melting temperature of the compounds was established. The developed model is useful for design of experiments and process control for producing nanostructured intermetallics through ball milling and mechanical attrition processes.