Fabrication and characterization of incorporated nickel coatings with different loadings of tungsten carbide microparticles: Investigation of mechanical and chemical properties

This study aims to investigate the strengthening effect of incorporated nickel coatings with different weight percentages (wt.%) of tungsten carbide (WC) microparticles on the various properties of the applied coatings on plain carbon steel. Therefore, different applied coatings, including pure and reinforced nickel with various wt.% of tungsten carbide were applied to the samples using the tungsten inert gas (TIG) welding method. Then, the microstructure, wear behavior, hardness, and corrosion of the coated samples with pure and incorporated nickel with 5, 10, and 20% tungsten carbide were obtained and compared with the uncoated sample. The obtained results show that reinforcing the applied coatings with WC has improved the behavior of the coatings in different properties so that the filled coating with 20% of tungsten carbide had the best results. For example, the wear rate of coated surfaces reinforced with 5, 10 and 20% of tungsten carbide was 12.56, 7.52, and 5.28 mg/m, respectively, which was much lower than the uncoated sample with a value of 24.41 mg/m. The maximum coating hardness equal to 49.6 Rockwell C was obtained for nickel coating reinforced with 20% of tungsten carbide, which can be due to the high percentage of powder compared to other samples, and the formation of finer grains. The corrosion results of the samples using cyclic polarization diagrams showed the improvement of the corrosion behavior by adding tungsten carbide so that the nickel coating reinforced with 20% of tungsten carbide had a corrosion current density of 7.15 × 10−7 amps/cm2. Finally, the obtained results show that strengthening the applied coatings by the TIG method using different wt.% of tungsten carbide up to 20% can improve the various properties of the coating.