Corrosion behavior of bulk two-phase Ag-25Cu alloys with different microstructures in NaCl aqueous solution

Abstract In order to have a better understanding on the corrosion mechanisms of bulk two-phase Ag-25Cu (at.%) alloys with different microstructures, two bulk nanocrystalline Ag-25Cu alloys and one coarse grained counterpart were prepared by liquid phase reduction (LPR), mechanical alloying (MA) and powder metallurgy (PM) methods, respectively. Their corrosion behavior was investigated comparatively using electrochemical methods in NaCl aqueous solution. Results show that the microstructure of the coarse grained PMAg-25Cu alloy is extremely inhomogeneous. On the contrary, compared with PMAg-25Cu alloy, the microstructures of the nanocrystalline LPRAg-25Cu and MAAg-25Cu alloys are more homogeneous, especially for LPRAg-25Cu alloy. The corrosion rate of MAAg-25Cu alloy is higher than that of PMAg-25Cu alloy, but lower than that of LPRAg-25Cu alloy. Furthermore, the passive films formed by three Ag-25Cu alloys exhibit n-type semiconducting properties. The passive current density of LPRAg-25Cu alloy is lower than that of PMAg-25Cu alloy, but higher that of MAAg-25Cu alloy.