Study On Performance Of Stainless Steel Coated With Silver As Bipolar Plate Of PEMFC

Bipolar plate is one of the critical components of proton exchange membrane fuel cell(PEMFC). The performance of Bipolar Plate directly affects the reliability, stability and longevity of proton exchange membrane fuel cell(PEMFC).Improving the stability, conductivity,anti-corrosion ability and waning the thickness,specific gravity of Bipolar plate, are the key of realizing commercialization application of proton exchange membrane fuel cell(PEMFC). Stainless steel is one of the most potential tenuity metal Bipolar Plate materials, which extensively researched at present. However,Because of the bad anti-corrosion ability, the surface of Stainless steel must be modified before the Stainless steel is applied as Bipolar plate material of proton exchange membrane fuel cell(PEMFC). Electroplating silver on the surface of Stainless steel is an common measure for surface modification at present.But there are always a lot of ventages in the silver layer,which signally confine the amplitude of improving anti-corrosion ability of Stainless steel.In this paper,the heat treatment in air drying oven and vacuum drying oven, self-assembly membrane methodology and non-chromium passivation methodology were operated on 316L steel coated with silver to ulteriorly improve the anti-corrosion ability of 316L steel coated with silver.The electrochemistry performance test of 316L steel coated with silver after different temperature and different time heat treatment was proceed in the simulation environment of proton exchange membrane fuel cell(PEMFC).The test result indicate: the performance of 316L steel coated with silver after the heat treatment of 150℃×2 h in air drying oven and 180℃×2h in vacuum drying oven is best.And the anti-corrosion ability of 316L steel coated with silver after the heat treatment of 150℃×2 h in air drying oven and 180℃×2h in vacuum drying oven is very close.,which is much better than 316L steel coated with silver without heat treatment.After self-assembly membrane methodology and non-chromium passivation methodology treatment,the surface of 316L steel coated with silver is more flattening and the ventages of silver layer decrease. The electrochemistry performance test indicate:at 0.3V anodic polarization potential, the anti-corrosion ability of 316L steel coated with silver after self-assembly membrane methodology and non-chromium passivation methodology treatment is very close,which is much better than 316L steel coated with silver without any treatment.But the membrane formed on 316L steel coated with silver after non-chromium passivation methodology treatment is more compact than the membrane formed on 316L steel coated with silver after self-assembly membrane methodology treatment.