Electrodeposition of nickel onto 12K carbon fibre tow in a continuous manner

Abstract

Nickel-coated carbon fibre (NiCCF) is an important composite material, which finds numerous engineering applications, primarily within: computer, telecommunication, automotive and military industries. In general, NiCCF can be produced by one of the three methods, namely: chemical vapour deposition (CVD), electroless, and electrochemical (galvanic) deposition of Ni on a carbon fibre tow material. The present paper reports a study of the process of nickel electrodeposition (at ultrathin layers of ≈ 0.3-0.5 μm) onto the surface of 12K (12 000 single filaments) carbon fibre (CF) tow, carried-out in a continuous way. In addition, the effect of selected pre-treatments applied to carbon fibre, as well as that of operational parameters of the process, on the quality of the NiCCF product were investigated.