The Corrosion Behavior of Graphene Reinforced Titanium Matrix Composites in 3.5 wt% NaCl Solution

Abstract

Graphene is widely preferred as a reinforcement element to enhance mostly mechanical properties of titanium matrix composites due to its unique properties. However, the number of detailed studies is quite limited in the literature on the corrosion properties of graphene reinforced titanium composites. Therefore, the effects of graphene amount on the corrosion properties of titanium composites were evaluated in this study. Pure titanium and graphene-titanium composites for various amount of graphene (0.15, 0.30 and 0.45 wt%) were produced by powder metallurgy. The electrochemical impedance spectroscopy was used to analyze the corrosion properties of the samples in 3.5 wt% NaCl solution. From the results, TiGr15 sample was observed as maximum corrosion resistance with 6.6939 x 10+5 (Omega & sdot;cm2). The cyclic potentiodynamic polarization method results showed that TiGr15 sample (0.0007 mA/cm2) has the lowest corrosion flow rate. Moreover, the SEM-EDX images of the corroded samples showed that the highest cohesion of constituent particles and the least amount of corrosion, particle separation were observed at Ti-0.15 wt% graphene.