Improving Anodizing Efficiency by Adding Different Amounts of Aluminum Powder to Anodizing Electrolyte for Pure Aluminum and Aluminum Alloy (6063)
Abstract
Different amounts of aluminum powder (5, 7, 9 and 11g/l) were added to sulfuricacid solution of the specimens under ideal conditions previously obtained (1) and theeffect of these additions was studied to find out it's benefit on anodizing efficiency forpure aluminum and aluminum alloy (6063).The specimens were examined in different conditions using optical microscope,roughness and hardness measurements.The study shows the anodizing process was improved by adding aluminumpowder with ideal conditions and the best value of aluminum powder was 9g/l,where the thickness improved from 72.25μm at ideal conditions to 81.25μm withadding 9g/l aluminum powder and the coating ratio improved from 1.481 at idealconditions to 1.541 with adding 9g/l aluminum powder for pure aluminum, while thethickness improved from 74.56μm at ideal conditions to 82.29μm with adding 9 g/laluminum powder and the coating ratio improved from 1.417 at ideal conditions to1.471 with adding 9g/l aluminum powder for aluminum alloy (6063).The study also shows that the effective anodic current efficiency was increasedabout 12.50% when adding aluminum powder of 9g/l compared with ideal conditionsfor pure aluminum, while this value was increased about 10.20% when addingaluminum powder of 9g/l compared with ideal conditions for aluminum alloy (6063)without adding aluminum powder.It is found that the surface roughness and hardness value of specimens with addingaluminum powder of 9g/l gives the best result compared with the specimens at idealconditions and bare specimens.
Keywords
aluminum powder, sulfuric acid, anodizing efficiency, aluminum alloy, 6063, effective anodic current efficiency.Metrics