Nanoindentation deformation of a bi-phase AlCrCuFeNi₂ alloy

High-entropy alloys (HEA) are multicomponent alloys with lattice structures, which have unique mechanical properties. Using X-ray diffraction, the structure of as cast AlCrCuFeNi₂ HEA was characterized. The AlCrCuFeNi₂ HEA consisted of body centered-cubic (BCC) solid solution and face centered-cubic (FCC) solid solution. Nanoindentation was used to characterize the indentation deformation of the FCC and BCC crystals in the AlCrCuFeNi₂ HEA. Both the indentation hardness and the contact modulus of the FCC and BCC crystals decreased slightly with the increase in the indentation load and became constant for large indentation loads. For the indentation load larger than 500 μN, the contact modulus and the indentation hardness of the BCC crystals are 146 and 4.6 GPa, respectively, and the contact modulus and the indentation hardness of the FCC crystals are 207 and 2.8 GPa, respectively. The plastic energy dissipated in the nanoindentation increased with the indentation load and was proportional to the 1.77 and 1.88 power of the indentation load for the FCC and BCC crystals, respectively. The ratio of the dissipated plastic energy to the total energy in the indentations was a linear function of the ratio of the residual indentation depth to the corresponding maximum indentation depth. The slope of the energy ratio verse the indentation depth ratio for the BCC crystals is larger than that for the FCC crystals.