Mg-Ni-Cu system prepared by the combined process of hydriding combustion synthesis with mechanical milling

  • Doctor Student Hao Gu, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Technology, China
  • Master Student Hao Cai, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Technology, China
  • Associate Professor Yunfeng Zhu, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Technology, China
  • Liquan Li, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Technology, China

    • In this paper, the combined method of hydriding combustion synthesis (HCS) and mechanical milling (MM) was utilized to prepare Mg-based hydrogen storage alloy of Mg-Ni-Cu ternary system. Mg95Ni5Cu2 was prepared by two routes. Route one was that Cu and the HCSed Mg95Ni5 were synthesized by HCS, followed by MM for the duration of 10 h. Route two was that Cu was milled together with the HCSed Mg95Ni5 for 10 h. The structure features of the samples were detected by means of X-ray diffraction (XRD), and the hydrogen storage properties were measured by a volumetric apparatus. Mg95Ni5Cu2 by both routes had the similar initial dehydriding temperature of 440 K, which was approximately 40 K lower than that of Mg95Ni5 prepared by HCS followed by MM. Additionally, Mg95Ni5Cu2 prepared by route two reached its saturated hydrogen capacity of 3.94 wt.% within 50 s at 373 K, whereas Mg95Ni5Cu2 prepared by route one only absorbed 0.43 wt.% of hydrogen within 50 s. The results showed that the addition of Cu during MM was favorable to the improvement of the absorption and desorption properties of Mg95Ni5. The mechnism for the improvement was discussed in this paper.