The authors wish to acknowledge the financial support of this work by the Australian government’s Australian Postgraduate Awards scheme and by the Australian Research Council (ARC Linkage Project LP130100111 - Wear-resistant alloys for the mining industry) in collaboration with Weir Minerals Australia Ltd and The University of Sydney. We also acknowledge the facilities, and the scientific and technical assistance, of Microscopy Australia (formerly Australian Microscopy & Microanalysis Research Facility) at the Australian Centre of Microscopy and Microanalysis, The University of Sydney. D. Dias-da-Costa would like to acknowledge the support from the Australian Research Council through its Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DE150101703) and from the Faculty of Engineering & Information Technologies,The University of Sydney, under the Faculty Research Cluster Program. C. Albino and D. Dias-da-Costa would like to extend their acknowledgements to FEDER through the Competitivity Factors Operational Programme (COMPETE) and to the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) within grant POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007633