Corrosion issues of powder coated AA6060 aluminium profiles

• We investigated powder coated AA6060 aluminium failed profiles during service.
• We found that failure of these windows profiles was associated to the surface defects present at the metal surface.
• These surface defects led to the corrosion attack on the powder coated windows profiles.
• Intergranular corrosion attack was observed on the failed aluminium AA6060 powder coated windows profiles.

In this study detailed microstructural investigation of the reason for unexpected corrosion of powder coated aluminium alloy AA6060 windows profiles has been performed. The results from this study reveals that the failure of the window profiles was originated from the surface defects present on the extruded AA6060 aluminium profile after metallurgical process prior to powder coating. Surface defects are produced due to intermetallic particles in the alloy, which disturb the flow during the extrusion process. The corrosion mechanism leading to the failure of the powder coated AA6060 aluminium profiles in service is explained.