The surface modification of aluminum by mechanical milling of Pb coating and high current pulsed electron beam irradiation

This paper reports the surface morphology and properties of Al substrates with Pb coating, which was deposited by mechanical milling and then treated by high current pulsed electron beam (HCPEB) irradiation. After HCPEB irradiation treatment, some previously formed defects such as micro-pits, craters, and bulged nodules were eliminated, resulting in significant reduction of surface roughness of initial Pb/Al sample, and the formation of a dense and adherent Pb/Al alloying layer. Notably, when the number of irradiation pulses reached 30, there was uniform distributions of Pb in the mixture of Pb and Al elements in the milled samples, which resulted in the formation of gray layers with thickness of 12 m (milling for 1 h) and 8 m (milling for 2 h). These formed layers effectively improved the wear resistance. Moreover, the hardness of Pb/Al sample also improved after HCPEB irradiation due to structure defect strengthening and ultra-fine Pb-rich particles reinforcement. The above results demonstrate that HCPEB treatment is an effective method to obtain high-quality alloy coating layer, resulting in the formation of an excellent alloy.