Effect of mechanical milling on the microstructure of tungsten under He+ irradiation condition

“Pure” W was prepared through a powder metallurgy route by using hard alloy (WC-Co) milling tank and balls to mill WO3 powder, reducing with high purity H2, and sintering with spark plasma sintering technique. XRD, SEM, and TEM were used to characterize the phase and phase structures. Results showed that the cobalt tungsten carbide (Co3W10C3.4) phase was induced from the milling tank and balls. After the “pure” W bulk was exposed to helium ions for 2 h, the cobalt tungsten carbide phase was found to be surrounded by the lattice distortion phase of W, which showed high irradiation resistance.