An overview of recent trends and challenges of post treatments on magnesium alloys

Abstract

The rise in manufacturing and operating expenses in the oil and gas sector, especially in the impact of corrosive environments and wear influences, has triggered technologists to concentrate more on effectual surface modification strategies on the machines and equipment being produced in recent days. Magnesium alloys are attractive metals in the lightweight materials group due to their lower density and higher specific strength. Even though the corrosion and tribological performance of magnesium alloys are not satisfactory and surface modification techniques are adopted with various coating methods such as electroplating, thermal spray, arc spray, and plasma spray methods to overcome these limitations. Recently, post-spraying technologies have been extensively used to enhance the whole performance of coatings, particularly those developed through the electro deposition, plasma spraying technique, high-velocity oxygen fuel spraying, PVD coatings, electro plating, laser cladding, anodizing, metal cladding, and friction stir processing methods. The development of lightweight components is one of the primary concerns of the automobile, aerospace, and electronics industries. Even though most efficient design procedures contribute to lightweight component development, the usage of lightweight materials plays a significant role. The current review investigates the enhancement of various type of coatings by the various types of post treatments. The purpose of this article is to quickly address future developments, the rising use of magnesium alloys with consideration of explosive environments, and post-treatment effects. Thus, it was concluded that the magnesium-based alloys clearly demonstrate a substantial improvement in their performance in terms of mechanical and corrosion resistance, creating a potential for their use in advanced production techniques for the automotive and aerospace industries. In addition, friction stir process was suggested as a novel post treatment method for metals and alloys. This comprehensive review has been motivated by these advantages of all the post-treatments methods.