Electropolishing of surfaces: theory and applications

TLDR

Electropolishing is an electrochemical process that removes metal from a workpiece to produce a smoother surface, and it is widely applied in industries such as food, medical, pharmaceutical, and semiconductors. This review aims to provide readers with an insightful understanding of electropolishing from both fundamental and application perspectives. The review discusses electropolishing fundamentals, classic setups, quantitative and qualitative theories, key process parameters, and microscopic evaluation techniques such as optical, electron, and atomic force microscopy.

Abstract

Electropolishing is the electrochemical process to remove the metallic material from the workpiece, in order to obtain a smoother metal surface. It has found vast engineering applications in many fields, such as food, medical, pharmaceutical and semiconductor industries. This review is aimed to provide the readership with insightful understanding of the electropolishing process, from the fundamental aspects as well as from the application aspects. The general aspects of electropolishing, including its definition, the classic setup, the fundamentals behind it and methods used to evaluate the electropolishing finishes are reviewed here. Various electropolishing theories, be them quantitative or qualitative are briefly discussed. Based on those theories, important parameters evolved in the electropolishing process are enumerated. Many microscopic technologies are used to evaluate the electropolishing surface finishes. This includes optical microscope, electron microscope and atomic force microscope. Some key features of electropolishing are briefly outlined in the end.