Isothermal furnace for long-term in situ and real-time X-radiography solidification experiments

A new x-ray isothermal furnace has been developed, suitable for in situ observations of semi-solid processes including the transition from dendritic to globulitic grain morphology and grain coarsening in metallic samples. A homogeneous, isothermal temperature field is achieved using a novel heater concept. The furnace structure is sandwich-like with heating elements positioned in the beam line and parallel to the sample. Planar heat transfer to the sample enables measurements with low cooling rates and a minimized temperature gradient. Cooling rates from 0.1 to 15 K min^-1 can be controlled in the temperature range 1170-670 K. The furnace setup is integrable in the existing rotatable laboratory x-ray facility (X-RISE) at the German Aerospace Center (DLR). In this setup, an effective pixel size of 3 μm and a field of view of 8 mm in diameter can be achieved. Preliminary solidification and semi-solid experiments in the hypo-eutectic alloy systems Al-Ge and Al-Cu, inoculated with Al-5Ti-1B grain refiner, are presented. They indicate a very uniform temperature distribution in the sample.