The Internal Oxidation of Ternary Alloys II: The Coupled Internal Oxidation of the Two Most-Reactive Components Under Intermediate Oxidant Pressures

The kinetics of the coupled internal oxidation of the two most-reactive components in the scaling of ternary alloys under oxidant pressures below the stability of the oxide of the most noble component are examined using a number of simplifying conditions which allow to develop an approximate analytical treatment. The precipitation of the two oxides may occur either at a single front or at two different fronts of internal oxidation. The former case corresponds to a unique solution for all the parameters involved in the process. On the contrary, the existence of two fronts of internal oxidation yields a finite range of possible solutions for the oxidation kinetics as well as for all the other relevant parameters. Even though the present treatment does not allow to predict which solution will be adopted by a real system, it is possible to set limits to the values of the parameters yielding physically-acceptable solutions. After considering a general case, the treatment is applied to a real system already examined experimentally.