FEA Based Design and Stability Study of Electroless Ni-P Coating Plated over a Stepped Shaft under Thermal Load

ABSTRACT

Modelling of Ni-P coating and substrate assembly is done using the finite element analysis framework. Coating having a thickness of 50 µm is applied over a stepped shaft made of stainless steel and analysed in Ansys Workbench at an elevated temperature of 200°C. The thermal effect on the system is studied and results are discussed in detail with respective figures. Elastic modulus of Ni-P coating required for the analysis is evaluated from the nanoindentation test under 10 mN load. The analysis focuses on the evaluation of the critical design parameters such as equivalent stress, total deformation, strain energy and thermal strain over the entire body. Besides, four separate paths are created on the model to study the difference of induced stress and strain energy between the contacting surfaces of the shaft and the coating. It is found that there is a sharp discontinuity in these values and this discontinuity is further interpreted as a measure of the stability of coating over the substrate. It is found that the higher the difference of stress and strain energy, lower is the stability of the assembly which is considered to be realistic and in accordance with the elasticity principles. .

KEYWORDS:

• Electroless coating (Ni-P)
• substrate (stepped shaft)
• FEA
• stain energy (SE)
• equivalent stress (Von Mises)
• thermal strain

Acknowledgement

This work is supported by the Surface Engineering Laboratory, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Jadavpur University, Kolkata-700032. The authors would like to thank the Central Research Facility (CRF), IIEST Shibpur, Howrah, for conducting the necessary testing as per the reqiurment of this project.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The authors confirm that all the required data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.