The authoritative public forum
  for Metal Finishing since 1989
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Is it possible to coat TiAlN on Nickel electroless plated surface?

I have a PVD coating machine and tried to apply TiAlN on electroless nickel plated surface. But the adhesion was not good. The coating temperature at around 400 Deg C.
Do you know the reason?

David Kwok
- China
2006

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2007

WHAT IS THE THICKNESS OF COATING You NEED?
WHAT IS THE SURFACE FINISH BEFORE COATING?
WHAT SURFACE CLEANING PROCEDURE YOU HAVE PERFORMED?
IT IA A SURFACE ENGINEERING PROCESS...OK....

BINU C. YELDOSE
- MADRAS, INDIA

Electroless nickel always has a tenacious nickel oxide on its surface. Before deposition, this layer must be cleaned (mechanically or chemically reduced).

Guillermo Marrufo
Monterrey, NL, Mexico
2007

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Once again we have a situation where something has gone wrong and help is requested to solve the problem, but no process information has been offered. Basically it looks like "I don't know what I have done but it didn't work, so what can I do to make it work properly?".
Without knowing what process has been used, we can only guess, but my best shot is you've got a dirty surface, so you need to get a clean nickel.
Cleaning the surface and making it free of nickel oxide is best done under vacuum, so if the nickel surface is pretreated by plasma discharge or some other ion bombardment process, you will get a chemically clean surface and you may get better adhesion, assuming your TiAlN process is working properly.

Trevor Crichton
R&D practical scientist
Chesham, Bucks, UK
2007