Three alloys in the Al-Cr system were investigated by means of X-ray diffraction (XRD) in order to verify the existence of the reported new phase Al11Cr4. The XRD results showed no evidence for the existence of the so-called new phase Al11Cr4. Based on the critically reviewed experimental data available in the literature and the present experimental results, the Al-Cr system was re-optimized using the CAL-PHAD approach with sublattice models (Al,Cr)(2)(Al,Cr)(3)(Cr)(2)(Al)(6) for gamma-H (high temperature phase) and (Al)(12)(Cr)(5)(Al,Cr)(9) for gamma-L (low temperature phase) according to their respective crystal structures. Subsequently, a thermodynamic description of the Al-Cr-Si system was obtained over the entire composition range based on the present thermodynamic description of the Al-Cr system, the previous descriptions for the Al-Si and Cr-Si systems as well as the experimental data from the literature. The present thermodynamic modeling can satisfactorily account for most of the reliable experimental data in this ternary system. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.