Modeling of Precipitation Coupled with Thermodynamic Calculations

Abstract : A precipitation model is developed based on three physical mechanisms, ie nucleation, growth and coarsening of the precipitates. The model follows the particle size distribution by using a finite volume method. Inputs of thermodynamic data are required, such as the driving force for nucleation and equilibrium concentrations. An ideal dilute solution, an ideal solution and a model fully coupled with the thermodynamic calculation software Thermo-Calc®[l] are used to describe the Gibbs energy of the different phases. The influence of using these different thermodynamic approximation on the prediction of the precipitation model is studied.