Institute of Metals Division - An Experimental Determination of the Electrical Resistivity of the Liquid Alloys Hg-In, Hg-Ti, Ga-In, Ga-Sn and of Liquid Gallium

The electrical resistivity and the temperature coefficient of resistivity were measured with a potentiometric method using pure mercury as a reference material. Measurements were made nea,v roorn temperature. A detailed study was made of Hg,TI, near its melting temperature. THE work to be described was originally undertaken to provide the necessary data for interpreting the results of some optical experiments,' but because of the growing importance of liquid metals,273 it appeared that the results of the resistivity measurements should be published separately. For convenience the alloys selected were those which are liquid at room temperature. Special consideration was given to the Hg-T1 alloy closely corresponding to Hg,Tl, because recent X-ray diffraction results of Smallman and Frost seemed to show that the solid structure may persist to some extent into the 1iquid. EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE A potentiometric method was employed in which the resistivity of mercury was used as a reference. The essential features of the samples are shown in Fig. 1. A capillary tube CT with a bore of approximately 1.5 mm was fitted into two end cups, T, which were made of Teflon. A pair of current electrodes CE were immersed into the excess liquid metal which partly filled the end cups. The potential electrodes PE were inserted into CT through short pieces N of a no. 18 hypodermic needle held in place with Saureisen cement SC. As shown, the lower ends of the PE7s were reduced in diameter to 0.25 mm to minimize the distortion of the liquid metal cross section. Several methods were used to insert an alloy into the sample, but the usual one with mercury alloys was to fill the sample container with a weighed quantity of pure mercury* and then add weighed the sample tube in a vacuum. Because of rapid corrosion, samples containing gallium were of necessity prepared in a vacuum. To obtain the specific resistivity of an alloy the resistance of the sample containing the alloy was measured and compared with the resistance when the container was filled with mercury. Resistances were measured in the temperature range of 20" to 60°C to obtain the temperature coefficient of resistance. The electrical measurements were made by connecting the sample in series with the standard one-ohm resistance, and the potential drop measured alternately over the sample and the standard resistance. To correct for stray thermoelectric effects provision was made for reversing the direction of the current, and the true potential drop was taken to be the average of that obtained for the two directions of current flow. Various materials were used for the electrodes, the most uniform results being obtained with nickel. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS The numerical results are presented graphically in Figs. 2 and 3 and in tabular form in Tables I and 11. Following are remarks on results of individual alloys. 1) Hg-In—This was the first alloy studied, and