Effects of HA and TiN Coating on the Electrochemical Characteristics of Ti-6Al-4 V Alloys for Bone Plates

Effects of HA and TiN coating on the electrochemical characteristics of Ti-6AI-4V alloys for bone plates were investigated using various test methods. Ti-6AI-4V alloys were fabricated by using a vacuum induction furnace and bone plates were made by laser cutting and polishing. HA was made of extracted tooth sintered and then tooth ash was used as HA coating target. The TiN and HA film coating on the surface were carried on using electron-beam physical vapor deposition (EB-PVD) method. The corrosion behaviors of the samples were examined through potentiodynamic method in 0.9% NaCI solutions at $36.5\pm$$1^{\circ}C$ and corrosion surface was observed using SEM and XPS. The surface roughness of TiN coated bone plates was lower than that of tooth ash coated plates. The structure of TiN coated layer showed the columnar structure and tooth ash coated layer showed equiaxed and anisotrophic structure. The corrosion potential of the TiN coated specimen is comparatively high. The active current density of TiN and tooth ash coated alloy showed the range of about $1.0xl0^{-5}$ $A\textrm{cm}^2$, whereas that of the non-coated alloy was$ 1.0xl0^{-4}$ $A\textrm{cm}^2$. The active current densities of HA and TiN coated bone plates were smaller than that of non-coated bone plates in 0.9% NaCl solution. The pitting potential of TiN and HA coated alloy is more drastically increased than that of the non-coated alloy. The pit number and pit size of TiN and HA coated alloy decreased in compared with those of non-coated alloy. For the coated samples, corrosion resistance increased in the order of TiN coated, tooth ash coated, and non-coated alloy.