Abstract
The effects of zinc coating and heat treatment on the corrosion resistance of aluminum alloys including A1100 and the modified A3003, used as heat exchanger tube were investigated in this study. The grain size of the heat-treated specimen is larger than that of the specimen without heat treatment, but the grain size did not significantly affect the corrosion behavior. The concentration of zinc was noted at 11.3 ~ 31.4 at.% for the as-received Zn-coated samples and reduced to 1.2 ~ 2.4 at.% after the heat treatment, as measured by the scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with an energy dispersive spectrometer (EDS) on the surface. The concentration of oxygen is 22 ~ 46 at.% for the zinc coated specimens while noted at 7.4 ~ 12.8 at.% for the specimens after the removal of the coating. The corrosion behavior depended largely on the concentrations of zinc, aluminum, and oxygen on the specimen surface, but not on the Mo content. The corrosion potential was high and the corrosion rate was low for a specimen with a low zinc content, a high aluminum content, and a high oxygen content.