Examination of Wetting by Liquid Zinc of Steel Sheets Following Various Kinds of Abrasive Blasting

Abrasive blasting is one of the methods of surface working before hot-dip zinc-coating. It allows not only to remove products of corrosion from the surface, but it also affects the quality of the zinc coating applied later, thereby affecting wettability of surface being zinc-coated. The surface working can be done with different types of abrasive material. The paper presents an effect of the method of abrasive blasting on wetting the surface of steel sheets by liquid zinc. Steels sheets following blasting with Al₂O₃ of different granularity and shot peening were examined. The worst wetting was recorded for a sample following shot peening - the results are below those for the reference test conducted for a sample not previously subjected to any treatment. Samples following abrasive blasting have similar parameters, regardless of the size of grain used for the treatment.