Improved corrosion resistant and mechanical behavior of distinct composite coatings (silica/titania/zirconia) on Ti-6Al-4V deposited by EPD

Synthesized composite powders (ZrO2/TiO2, SiO2/TiO2, and SiO2/ZrO2) were successfully deposited on Ti-6Al-4V by electrophoretic deposition method (EPD) to improve its electrochemical characteristics for better biomedical applications. In the present investigation, the three composite powders were prepared by sol-gel synthesis and its phase purity was analyzed by Powder X-ray diffraction (XRD) method. Further, the performance of the deposited coatings was assessed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) coupled with energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDAX), scratch resistance test. The electrochemical properties of the composite coatings were analyzed by Potentiodynamic (Tafel) polarization and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) studies. From the results, we observed that the corrosion resistance behavior of the different composite coated metallic substrate exhibited divergent corrosion resistance nature than blank Ti-6Al-4V. Of all these coatings on Ti-6Al-4V, the composite made up of, ZrO2/TiO2 has pronounced corrosion resistance behavior in Ringer's solution when compared to others. This behavior is due to the presence of strong adherent coating owing to the existence of uniform deposition on Ti-6Al-4V.