Influence of deformation processing on magnetocaloric effect of Heusler alloys

Abstract

This paper presents the results of complex studies of the effect of deformation obtained by the multiple isothermal forging method on the magnetocaloric properties of the Ni-Mn-Ga Heusler alloy system. Direct measurements of the adiabatic temperature change show that cycling the sample in a magnetic field μ0ΔH=1,85 T can decrease the maximum of ΔTad(T)0→H by the value corresponding to the latent heat of transition. Neglecting this transformation effect leads to an overestimation of the magnetocaloric effect of materials with the first-order transition. An analysis of the deformation treatment effect on the phase transformation temperatures and the magnitude of the magnetocaloric effect indicates that the application of multiple isothermal forging leads to a small decrease of the magnetization and the magnitude of the magnetocaloric effect. Deformation also causes a shift in the phase transition temperature towards low temperatures and decrease of the temperature hysteresis width.

Keywords

• heusler alloys
• multiple isothermal forging
• magnetocaloric effect
• magnetostructural phase transition