Effect of coating current density on the wettability of electrodeposited copper thin film on aluminum substrate

Abstract

Summary Copper is the only one solid metal registered by the US Environmental Protection Agency as an antimicrobial touch surface. In touch surface applications, wettability of the surface has high significance. The killing rate of the harmful microbes depends on the wetting of pathogenic solution. Compared to the bulk copper, coated one on aluminum has the advantage of economic competitiveness and the possibility of manufacturing complex shapes. In the present work, the copper coating on the aluminum surface has successfully carried out by electrodeposition using non cyanide alkaline bath. To ensure good adhesion strength, the substrate has been pre-zincated prior to copper deposition. The coating current density is one of the important parameters which determine the nucleation density of the copper on the substrate. To understand the effect of current density on wettability, the coating has done at different current densities in the range of 3 A dm−2 to 9 A dm−2 for fixed time interval. The grain size has been measured from TEM micrographs and showed that as current density increases, grain size reduces from 62 nm to 35 nm. Since the grain size reduces, grain boundary volume has increases. As a result the value of strain energy (calculated by Williamson–Hall method) has increased. The density of nodular morphology observed in SEM analysis has been increased with coating current density. Further, wettability studies with respect to double distilled water on the electrodeposited copper coatings which are coated at different current densities are carried out. At higher current density the coating is more wettable by water because at these conditions grain size of the coating decreases and morphology of grain changes to a favorable dense nodularity.