| Abstract |
To address scaling issues and understand the chemical and physical properties of a scale, it is important to determine phase ratios through quantitative analysis accurately. It is challenging to quantify a scale including an amorphous phase, especially two or more amorphous phases. In our previous study, we succeeded in quantifying the amounts of amorphous silica and poor crystalline smectite in both synthetic and actual scale samples by the PONKCS (Partial Or No Known Crystal Structures) / Rietveld approach. However, the previous quantitative analysis method lacks precision when a scale contains an amorphous phase with preferred orientation. In this study, we aimed to apply the PONKCS / Rietveld approach to smectite phases with preferred orientation. To account for this effect, we applied a PONKCS / Rietveld approach, which installed the March–Dollase function. We prepared a mixture of purified smectite, which had relatively high crystallinity and tended to cause strong preferred orientation, and artificial amorphous silica. We investigated how the PONKCS / Rietveld approach could compensate for preferred orientation and provide reliable quantitative results. These findings suggest that the PONKCS / Rietveld approach is helpful for quantifying scale, including amorphous phases and clay minerals that are often difficult to analyze by conventional techniques. |