Effect of milling time on the structural, microstructure and magnetic properties of nanocrystalline Fe90Sb10 powders obtained by high energy ball milling

Abstract Nanocrystalline binary powders Fe90Sb10 (wt.%) have been elaborated by high energy ball milling in order to study the effect of the milling time on the microstructural and magnetic properties of these alloys. The evolution of structural, morphological and magnetic properties were investigated, as a function of milling time, using the X-ray diffraction (XRD), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) coupled with Energy Dispersive X-ray spectrometry (EDX) and the vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM). A disordered Fe (Sb) solid solution with body centered cubic (bcc) crystal structure is formed after twelve hours of milling from XRD results. When the milling time increases, the lattice parameter progressively increases from 0.2861 nm for the Fe90Sb10 (zero hour milling) compound down to 0.2870 nm for thirty six hours of milling. The sample with the longest milling time has exhibited the lowest value for the mean grain size of 18.16 nm as well as the microstrain of 0.19%. Grain morphology of the powders at different formation stages was examined using scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The chemical composition homogeneity the powder form Fe90Sb10 (wt.%) were studied done with EDX experiments. For Fe-10Sb (wt.%) nanostructured powders, magnetisation saturation ,coercive fields and remnant magnetisation derived from the hysteresis curves were discussed as a function of milling time.