Abstract—The quality of nickel electroplating on gray cast iron is crucial for applications requiring enhanced surface properties, such as increased hardness and corrosion resistance. Nickel electroplating is widely used to improve surface characteristics, but the relationship between dipping time and the resulting thickness, hardness, and corrosion resistance is not well established. This study investigates the effect of varying dipping times on the thickness of nickel electroplating and its subsequent impact on the hardness and corrosion resistance of gray cast iron substrates. A series of electroplating experiments were conducted with different dipping times to analyze their influence on the thickness of the nickel layer. The hardness and corrosion resistance of the electroplated samples were then measured to assess the impact of the varying layer thickness. The findings revealed that increased dipping times resulted in thicker nickel layers, which correspondingly led to a significant increase in the surface hardness of the gray cast iron. Test results also show that extending the dipping time of nickel electroplating reduced the corrosion rate of gray cast iron when tested with seawater electrolyte. The study concludes that optimizing dipping time is essential for achieving the desired balance between coating thickness, hardness, and corrosion resistance. These results provide valuable insights for industries that rely on nickel electroplating for enhancing the hardness and corrosion protection of gray cast iron components.

Keywords—corrosion, electroplating, gray cast iron, hardness

Cite: Agus Yulianto, Agung S. Darmawan, Herry Purnama, Bibit Sugito, Turnad L. Ginta, and Abdul Hamid, "Enhancing Gray Cast Iron with Varying Nickel Electroplating Times," International Journal of Mechanical Engineering and Robotics Research, Vol. 13, No. 6, pp. 601-607, 2024.

Copyright © 2024 by the authors. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided that the article is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.