Tailored Nickel Base Multilayer Systems with Adjusted Grain Size and Chemical Composition

Metal multilayers exhibit improved material properties in a wide range of applications. Used as coatings, they can make a component more resistant to wear or corrosion in particular environments. Multilayer coatings can also be used to add additional properties to a component and make it multifunctional. The fabrication and characterization of multilayers are therefore an important issue. Herein, both the fabrication and characterization of Ni/Cu and nanocrystalline/coarse‐grained Ni (nc/cg‐Ni) multilayers are presented. The production by means of electrodeposition also allows a variation of layer thicknesses from a few nanometers up to a few hundred micrometers and is easily scalable to industrial application. This article describes the single‐bath deposition and analyzes the microstructure and composition of the homogeneously deposited Ni/Cu and nc/cg‐Ni multilayers. A modulation of hardness in nc/cg‐Ni varying from 4.9 to 6.1 GPa is achieved while the elastic modulus is nearly constant. In Ni/Cu multilayers, hardness varies from 6.4 to 6.1 GPa in the Ni‐ and Cu‐rich layers, respectively. Additionally, the reduced Young's modulus ranges from 187.2 (Ni‐rich) to 169.8 GPa (Cu‐rich). The layer interfaces in both sample types are tested using microbending cantilevers and are found be pore‐free, mechanically stable and show crack‐free plastic deformation.