Determination of Eutectic Melting Phase Transition Temperature of Metal-Carbon Eutectic Fixed Points.

International Temperature Scale-1990 (ITS-90) is formulated based on various phase transition temperatures of high pure substances to cover the temperature range from 0.65 K to 1357.77 K (-272.5 °C to 1084.62 °C), where kelvin is defined on triple point of water (TPW) at 273.16 K and the higher defined fixed point is freezing point of copper at 1357.77 K. To extend the temperature scale at higher temperatures, metal-carbon eutectic fixed points are extensively being developed as the reference standards upto 3000 °C for thermometry and radiometry applications. The assignment of the eutectic melting transition temperatures to these metal-carbon eutectics is challenging as the melting plateaus are not as flat and wide as the conventional high pure metal fixed points. This paper presents the method to determine eutectic melting transition temperature by calculating inflection point for Fe-C and Co-C eutectic fixed point cells developed at CSIR-NPL, the national metrology institute (NMI)of India. The noble metal Type-S thermocouple calibrated on ITS-90 fixed points was used to measure and determine the melting transition temperatures of Fe-C and Co-C cells, and the associated uncertainties in determination of transition temperatures were evaluated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]