Effect of atmospheric pressure plasma treatment on the wettability and aging behavior of metal surfaces

Abstract Atmospheric pressure plasma (APP) applications have started to come to the fore today because of their fast and stable applicability to material surfaces and many advantages compared to plasma applications made under vacuum. With APP, it is possible to improve the surface energies, adhesion behavior and surface mechanical properties of materials. However, the changes obtained are not permanent since the surface tends to return to its untreated original state after plasma treatment. In this study, the wettability of APP treated metal surfaces, aging behavior and storage conditions that can delay the return of the surface to its untreated initial state were investigated. While one type of material (H300LAD), two different plasma treatments (cold and hot) and three different plasma treatment numbers (1, 2 and 3 times) were determined as test parameters; two different ambient conditions such as air and water (for 1, 10 and 60 min) were chosen as the storage conditions that can delay the return of the plasma treated surfaces to their original state. In addition, the effects of temperature on the aging time were investigated for two different temperature values (−20 °C and 30 °C). The effects of the applied plasma type, plasma treatment number, the storage conditions in which the samples were kept and the temperature on the aging behavior were evaluated and the conditions that could delay the aging time were investigated. The results showed that aging is greatly affected by the type of plasma applied to the surfaces, the storage conditions in which the samples were kept and the temperature.