Abstract
Indenter dependent indentation behaviors of the Zr-based bulk metallic glass, such as adhesion, serrated flows, shear bands, residual indent morphologies, were found and analyzed in this paper. An interesting phenomenon is presented that adhesion of the Zr-based bulk metallic glass appears during the indentation test using the cube-corner indenter but it’s not observed when using the Berkovich indenter. Corresponding to the adhesion behavior, “dirty” but new surfaces with the nano-scale dimple structure are formed by the cube-corner indenter while relatively smooth surfaces with few discrete shear bands are obtained by the Berkovich indenter. Indentation experiments indicate that the adhesion force between the cube-corner indenter and the Zr-based bulk metallic glass depends on the loading rate, the maximum penetration load and the cyclic loading number. These phenomena will enhance understanding of shear band formation, shear-induced softening, and adhesion of bulk metallic glasses.
