Development of eutectic high entropy alloy by addition of W to CoCrFeNi HEA

High entropy alloys have shown a remarkable combination of physical and mechanical properties. The introduction of eutectic microstructure, consisting of a tough fcc phase, and a hard-intermetallic phase, can help in obtaining even better synergy of strength and ductility. The presence of multiple principal alloying elements in HEAs and absence of corresponding multicomponent phase diagrams makes designing of eutectic high entropy alloys a tedious task. In the present study, systematic investigation of CoCrFeNi-Wx system has been carried out for the development of eutectic microstructure. Experimental results validated the presence of eutectic reaction in the calculated phase diagram. CoCrFeNi-Wx HEAs remained single fcc phase alloys at smaller amount of W (x = 0.1) but changed to hypoeutectic (x = 0.25, 0.5, 0.75) and hypereutectic alloys (x = 1.0) with increase in the amount of tungsten. It has been shown that calculated pseudo binary phase diagrams can provide a very good starting point for the development of eutectic HEAs. Mechanical characterization of the developed HEAs revealed that development of eutectic mixture of a soft (fcc) and a hard phase (intermetallic/bcc) can help in obtaining outstanding combination of mechanical properties.