Title: Fractal characterisation of electroless Ni-B coating and optimisation of coating parameters

Authors: Suman Kalyan Das; Prasanta Sahoo

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Jadavpur University, Kolkata 700032, India. ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, Jadavpur University, Kolkata 700032, India

Abstract: This paper presents an experimental study of fractal characteristics of the surface profile of electroless Ni-B coating and optimisation of coating parameters based on L₂₇ Taguchi orthogonal design. Optimum coating parameter combinations are identified to yield the optimum (maximum) fractal dimension by Taguchi analysis so that a smoother coating surface is obtained. Bath temperature is found to be the most important coating parameter in controlling the fractal characteristics of Ni-B coatings. The interaction between reducing agent concentration and the nickel source concentration also has high contribution in controlling the fractal characteristics of Ni-B coating. The coating is characterised for its microstructure and composition by scanning electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction analysis and energy dispersive X-ray analysis.

Keywords: electroless coatings; Ni-B coatings; nickel boron; Taguchi methods; optimisation; orthogonal arrays; fractal; coating parameters.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCMSSE.2011.045584

International Journal of Computational Materials Science and Surface Engineering, 2011 Vol.4 No.4, pp.326 - 346

Received: 19 Jul 2010
Accepted: 08 Jul 2011
Published online: 11 Jan 2015 *

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