Effect of Nickel and Magnesium on the Electrochemical Behavior of AA 1050 Alloys in Nitric Acid Solution

Abstract

The study investigates the influence of nickel and magnesium additions to AA 1050 aluminum alloy on the electrochemical behavior of the alloy in nitric acid solution under conditions relevant to the lithographic and electronic industries. Magnesium and nickel additions are of interest, since they can improve the alloy properties for the printing process by improving reverse bending fatigue strength and thermal softening resistance, while nickel may provide uniform pitting during electrograining. Scanning electron microscopy was used to characterize the resulting surface morphologies. The addition of nickel led to an increase in the pitting and corrosion potentials; additionally, it reduced the rate of dissolution of intermetallic particles during anodic polarization and increased the rate of aluminum dissolution during cathodic polarization. In contrast, the addition of magnesium had negligible influence on the open circuit and pitting behaviors, since the magnesium is retained in solid solution and has negligible influence on the cathodic behavior of intermetallic particles, which dominate the corrosion behavior.