AlN nanopowders are successfully synthesized via electrical Al wire explosion in liquid nitrogen. After pickling in 15 % HCl-ethanel, the purified AlN nanopowders are characterized by various techniques. It is observed that the synthesized AlN nanoparticles are hexagonal AlN (h-AlN) exhibiting various shapes, including sphere, spheroidicity, polygon and hexagon. The results show that the charging voltage affects on the AlN content and the morphology of samples, significantly. Further more, it is observed that synthesized AlN particles in the size of 100-300 nm are coated by an amorphous layer mostly resulted from the high cooling rate in liquid nitrogen.
With different charging energies, the wire voltages and currents were measured when the molybdenum wire explosions occurred and the coatings were sprayed on the aluminum alloy substrates. The measured voltages and currents were brought into calculating the deposited energies of the molybdenum wires. And the coatings were characterized by observing their cross sections with a Scanning Electron Microscope and testing their thickness, surface roughness and hardness. The results revealed that when the charging energy was higher, the growth rate and value of the deposited energy would be larger, the coating became denser and smoother, and the average thickness and the surface roughness were smaller, while the average hardness firstly increased, and then decreased with the ascension of the charging energy.
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