NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF AN EQUILIBRIUM SEGREGATION OF IMPURITIES ON THE GRAIN BOUNDARIES OF COPPER AND ITS ALLOYS

The presented paper deals with a numerical simulation of vacancy diffusion of sulphur, tin and phosphorus atoms to the grain boundary of the structure of copper, type (2D). It was theoretically applied to analysed model alloys of types Cu-S and Cu-Sn, particularly tin bronzes. Its purpose is to verify the obtained experimental results concerning this phenomenon, making use of the Auger method of spectroscopy of electrons (AES). Distinct effects of the segregation of sulphur atoms in the monolayer at the grain boundaries were found as well as an enrichment of the grain boundaries with tin atoms. In addition, the visualization of the simulation revealed a possible formation of stationary clusters of vacancies and segregating atoms on the analysed matrix of the atom structure (2D). The simulated effects of the segregation of S and Sn to the grain boundary, analysed as a function of the number of the cycles of the simulation are characterized by a statistically good repeatability of the results.