This article discusses surface engineering of nonferrous metals including aluminum and aluminum alloys, copper and copper alloys, magnesium alloys, nickel and nickel alloys, titanium and titanium alloys, zirconium and hafnium, zinc alloys, and refractory metals and alloys. It describes various techniques to improve functional surface properties and enhance the appearance of product forms. The article discusses various cleaning and finishing techniques such as abrasive blast cleaning, polishing and buffing, barrel burnishing, chemical cleaning, pickling, etching and bright dipping, electrochemical cleaning, mechanical cleaning, and mass finishing. It also examines coating processes such as plating, anodizing, chemical conversion coating, and thermal spray, and concludes with a discussion on oxidation-resistant coatings for refractory metals.

This article focuses on precision and ultraprecision finish machining techniques that make use of defined cutting edges, such as polycrystalline diamond and cubic boron nitride compacts. The techniques are finish turning, finish broaching, finish milling, and finish drilling.

Aluminum or aluminum alloy products have various types of finishes applied to their surfaces to enhance appearance or improve functional properties. This article discusses the procedures, considerations, and applications of various methods employed in the cleaning, finishing, and coating of aluminum. These include abrasive blast cleaning, barrel finishing, polishing, buffing, satin finishing, chemical cleaning, chemical brightening, electrolytic brightening, chemical etching, alkaline etching, acid etching, chemical conversion coating, electroplating, immersion plating, electroless plating, porcelain enameling, and shot peening.

The selection of surface treatments for copper and copper alloys is generally based on application requirements for appearance and corrosion resistance. This article describes cleaning, finishing, and coating processes for copper and copper alloys. These processes include pickling and bright dipping, abrasive blast cleaning, chemical and electrochemical cleaning, mass finishing, polishing and buffing, electroless plating, immersion plating, electroplating, passivation, coloring, and organic coatings.

Mass finishing normally involves loading components to be finished into a container together with abrasive media, water, and compound. This article focuses on basic mass finishing processes, including barrel finishing, vibratory finishing, centrifugal disc and barrel finishing, spindle finishing, and drag finishing. It describes the various factors considered in selecting the most suitable mass finishing process. The article also provides information on consumable materials, process considerations, safety precautions, and waste disposal of mass finishing processes.

Copper alloys are widely used as electroplated coatings. They can also be used with practically any substrate material that is suitable for electroplating. This article focuses on the solution composition and operating conditions for brass and bronze plating solutions. It describes the decorative and engineering applications of brass and bronze plating. The article also provides information on the treatment of waste water from brass and bronze plating operations.

This article discusses the characteristics, properties, and production methods of copper powders and copper alloy powders. Bulk of the discussion is devoted to production and applications of powder metallurgy (P/M) parts, including pure copper P/M parts, bronze P/M parts, brass and nickel silver P/M parts, copper-nickel P/M parts, copper-lead P/M parts, copper-base P/M friction materials, copper-base P/M electrical contact materials, copper-base P/M brush materials, infiltrated parts, and oxide-dispersion-strengthened copper P/M materials.

Independent verification of coating system performance can be based on laboratory testing and/or field exposure. Qualification testing is a critical component to coating system selection. This article focuses on performance evaluations that are used to prequalify coating systems, namely, facility-specific, industry-specific, coating-type-specific, or a combination of these. It describes the standard laboratory tests used to generate performance data, namely, physical, compositional, chemical exposure, and application characteristics tests. The pros and cons of using manufacturer-generated data versus independently generated data are discussed. The article provides information on accelerated corrosion/weathering testing and nuclear level 1/level 2 service coatings qualification. It also describes the procedures for establishing minimum performance requirements and for determining when requalification testing may be required.

Mechanical plating is a method for coating ferrous metals, copper alloys, lead, stainless steel, and certain types of castings by tumbling the parts in a mixture of glass beads, metallic dust or powder, promoter or accelerator chemicals, and water. It offers a straightforward alternative method for achieving desired mechanical and galvanic properties with an extremely low risk of hydrogen embrittlement. This article provides a detailed description of the equipment, process steps, process capabilities, applicable parts, specific characteristics, advantages, limitations, post treatments, and waste treatment of mechanical plating.

Visual examination, using the unaided eye or a low-power optical magnifier, is typically one of the first steps in a failure investigation. This article presents the guidelines for selecting samples for scanning electron microscope examination and optical metallography and for cleaning fracture surfaces. It discusses damage characterization of metals, covering various factors that influence the damage, namely stress, aggressive environment, temperature, and discontinuities.

This article discusses the operating principles, types, and applications of shearing and slitting of different forms of steel, including plates, flat sheets, bars, coiled sheet and strips. In addition, it provides a detailed account of the cutting methods such as oxyfuel gas cutting, plasma arc cutting, oxygen arc cutting, laser beam cutting, and air carbon arc cutting and gouging, describing their process capabilities, equipment used, operating principles and parameters, and factors affecting their efficiency.

This article reviews the general aspects of product design and provides an overview of the manufacturing processes and their relationship to design, with an emphasis on deformation processes. It discusses the various classes of deformation processes to illustrate their impacts on product design while taking advantage of the benefits of deformation processing.

A wide range of flow-formed open- and close-ended shapes are currently available in a variety of difficult-to-form materials, including titanium alloys and nickel-base super alloys. This article describes the two basic methods of flow forming that are characterized by the position of the rolls during the forming process. The flow forming methods include staggered-roll flow forming process and in-line flow-forming process. Typical mechanical properties of flow-formed materials in various conditions are summarized in a table. Proper process controls and subsequent product qualification tests are critical to assure optimal performance of the flow-formed tubular component. The article discusses the most commonly required process control parameters and the effects of forming speed and temperature in the flow forming process.

This article is an atlas of fractographs that helps in understanding the causes and mechanisms of fracture of austenitic stainless steels and in identifying and interpreting the morphology of fracture surfaces. The fractographs illustrate the following: fatigue-crack fracture, rock candy fracture, cleavage fracture, brittle fracture, high-cycle fatigue fracture, fatigue striations, hydrogen-embrittlement failure, creep crack propagation, fatigue crack nucleation, intergranular creep fracture, torsional overload fracture, stress-corrosion cracking, and grain-boundary damage of these steels. The austenitic stainless steel components include spring wires, preheater-reactor slurry transfer lines and gas lines of coal-liquefaction pilot plants, oil feed tubes and suction couch rolls of paper machines, cortical screws and compression hip screws of orthopedic implants, and Jewett nails.

Fracture surfaces are fragile and subject to mechanical and environmental damage that can destroy microstructural features. This article discusses the importance of care and handling of fractures and the factors that need to be considered during the preliminary visual examination. It describes the procedures for sectioning a fracture and opening secondary cracks as well as the effect of nondestructive inspection on subsequent evaluation. The article provides information on the most common techniques for cleaning fracture surfaces. These techniques are dry air blast cleaning, replica stripping, organic-solvent cleaning, water-base detergent cleaning, cathodic cleaning, and chemical-etch cleaning.

Selective plating, also known as brush plating, differs from traditional tank or bath plating in that the workpiece is not immersed in a plating solution (electrolyte). Instead, the electrolyte is brought to the part and applied by a handheld anode or stylus, which incorporates an absorbent wrapping for applying the solution to the workpiece (cathode). This article focuses on the selective plating systems that include a power pack, plating tools, anode covers, specially formulated plating solutions, and any auxiliary equipment required for the particular application. It provides a detailed account of the applications of selective plating, with examples. The article describes the advantages, limitations, key process elements, and health and safety considerations of selective plating. It also includes the most important industrial, government, and military specifications.

Zinc and zinc alloys require surface engineering prior to coating or use to improve adhesion and corrosion resistance. Die-cast zinc parts, in addition, must be trimmed and finished to remove flash and parting lines. This article covers zinc cleaning procedures as well as coating and finishing processes. It explains how to remove parting lines and presents several mechanical finishing methods, including surface polishing, brushing, controlled shot peening, and buffing. It also provides information on solvent cleaning, emulsion cleaning, aqueous detergent or alkaline cleaning), electrocleaning, acid dipping, and zinc conversion coating treatments.

This article discusses the concepts of quality control (QC) and quality assurance (QA), and clarifies the differences and similarities in the roles and responsibilities of QC and QA personnel. It describes the inspection procedures used to verify proper surface preparation and installation of the protective coating/lining system. Prior to beginning surface-preparation operations, many specifications will require a presurface-preparation inspection to verify the correction of fabrication defects and removal of surface contamination such as grease, oil, cutting compounds, lubricants, and chemical contaminants. When inspecting concrete prior to coating installation, three areas of concern exist: surface roughness, moisture content in concrete, and acidity/alkalinity of the surface. The article provides information on the industry standards for assessing surface cleanliness. It details postcoating application quality requirements, including measuring of dry-film thickness, assessing intercoat cleanliness, verifying minimum and maximum recoat intervals, performing holiday/pinhole detection, conducting cure/hardness testing, and assessing adhesion of the applied coating system.

This article focuses on the principles and applications of thermal desorption spectroscopy (TDS) use to study adsorption, desorption, and reaction of adsorbed atoms and molecules on surfaces. The discussion provides information on various components of and specimen preparation processes for a TDS experiment. The factors that must be considered when performing TPD experiments and several methods of analyzing TPD data are covered. A few studies where TPD was used to elucidate surface reactions that impact the tribological performances of materials are also discussed.

Nickel alloys can be divided into four groups: high-nickel alloys, nickel-copper alloys, nickel-chromium alloys, and nickel-iron-chromium alloys. Alloys within each composition group that has similar surface conditions are pickled in the same solutions using the same procedures. This article discusses the procedures used for pickling nickel and nickel alloys. It discusses three different surface conditions for pickling these nickel alloys: bright annealed white surface requiring removal of tarnish by flash pickling; bright annealed oxidized surface requiring removal of a layer of reduced oxide, sometimes followed by a flash pickle to brighten; and black or dark-colored surface requiring removal of adherent oxide film or scale. The article also reviews specialized pickling operations of nickel alloys and various cleaning and finishing operations, including grinding, polishing, buffing, brushing, and blasting.