Absolute stability of the solidification interface in a laser resolidified Zn--2wt.%Cu hypoperitectic alloy

This paper reports on laser surface remelting experiments performed on a Zn--2wt.%Cu hypoperitectic alloy by employing a 5kW CW CO₂ laser at scanning velocities between 6 and 1207mm/s. The growth velocities of the microstructures in the laser molten pool were accurately measured. The planar interface structure caused by the high velocity absolute stability was achieved at a growth velocity of 210 mm/s. An implicit expression of the critical solidification velocity for the cellular--planar transition was carried out by nonlinear stability analyses of the planar interface. The results showed a better agreement with the measured critical velocity than that predicted by M--S theory. Cell-free structures were observed throughout the whole molten pool at a scanning velocity of 652~mm/s and the calculated minimum temperature gradient in this molten pool was very close to the critical temperature gradient for high gradient absolute stability (HGAS) of the \eta phase. This indicates that HGAS was successfully achieved in the present experiments.