Surface & Coatings Technology 288 (2016) 814

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Surface & Coatings Technology

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/surfcoat

Effect of interface modication by Cu-coated W powders on the

microstructure evolution and properties improvement for Cu
W composites
Pingan Chen a, Qiang Shen b, Guoqiang Luo b,, Chuanbing Wang b, Meijuan Li b, Lianmeng Zhang b,
Xiangchen Li a, Boquan Zhu a
a
b

The State Key Lab of Refractories and Metallurgy, Wuhan University of Science and Technology, Wuhan 430081, China
State Key Laboratory of Advanced Technology for Materials Synthesis and Processing, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan 430070, China

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 24 July 2015
Revised 27 September 2015
Accepted in revised form 9 January 2016
Available online 11 January 2016
Keywords:
CuW composites
Interfacial bond
Microstructural evolution
Properties improvement

a b s t r a c t
The effects of interfacial bond and homogeneous microstructure on the physical properties of CuW composites
have been investigated. To acquire strong interfacial bond and homogeneous microstructure, different modied
W powders have been designed, which W powders were coated with different Cu contents using electroless plating
method. The results showed that by increasing the Cu content of the coating, the microstructure of CuW composites becomes homogeneous, and the physical properties, including thermal, electrical and mechanical properties,
improved greatly. When 20Cu@W composite powders were used to fabricate CuW composites, the physical properties reached the optimal values: The thermal conductivity was 239 W/(mK) which was close to the theoretical
vaule of 240 W/(mK), the electrical conductivity was 50.6%IACS, coefcient of thermal expansion was the minimum value of 7.3 106/K, the bending strength and Vickers hardness were 976.7 MPa and 224.8 HV, respectively.
These optimal values were much higher than those of mixed CuW composites. The properties enhancement of
CuW composites is attributed to the strong interfacial bond between Cu and W and homogeneous microstructure.
This enhancement effect was strengthened by increasing the coating's Cu content, resulting in the continuous
improvement of the physical properties.
2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Due to their low coefcient of thermal expansion, high thermal and
electrical conductivity, coppertungsten (CuW) composites have been
widely used in many applications such as heat sinks, electrodes and
vacuum interrupter [13]. Also, CuW composites can be used as kinetic
projectiles, armor penetrators, warhead materials and so on [4,5].
However, the fabrication of CuW composites proves to be difcult
because Cu and W are completely immiscible in both solid and liquid
phases. Therefore, the most effective way to fabricate CuW composites
is powder metallurgy. Conventionally, there are several alternative
methods to fabricate CuW composites, such as liquid-phase sintering,
inltration and activated sintering. Bhalla et al. [6] have fabricated full
density CuW composite by liquid-phase sintering using explosive
method, and Yang et al. [7] have prepared CuW composites by inltration. Although liquid-phase sintering at high temperature and inltration
could fabricate CuW composites with full densication, the sintering
temperatures of both methods are higher than the melting point of Cu
(Tm = 1358 K) leading to Cu exudation, so it is difcult to acquire the
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: luogq@whut.edu.cn (G. Luo).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.surfcoat.2016.01.014
0257-8972/ 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

accurate composition for CuW composites. After that, activated sintering

and mechanical alloying have been used to prepare CuW composites
aiming for lowering the sintering temperature in recent years. Johnson
et al. [89 and Chen et al. [1011] have prepared CuW composites by
the addition of Pd, Ni, Co, Fe, and Zn to modify the interface between Cu
and W, and found that the wettability between Cu and W improved a
lot. Kecskes et al. [12] prepared CuW composites by mechanical alloying
and studied the effects of ball milling time and media on the densication
of CuW composites. But the third phases such as Ni, Fe, Pd and Zn were
introduced into the CuW composite powders, which degraded the
thermal and electrical properties of CuW composites. However, for
CuW composites, it is important to obtain high thermal and electrical
conductivity, low coefcient of thermal expansion (CTE), and high
bending strength and hardness. The above mentioned methods either
change the theoretical composition or degrade the properties of CuW
composites.
Compared with those methods, it is more effective to modify W
powders by electroless plating method to low sintering temperature
and obtain high properties, because electroless plating method could
obtain Cu coating on W powders without impurities. What's more,
electroless plating method could achieve uniform deposition on the
W powders, regardless of their shapes or sizes. For example, Amirjan

P. Chen et al. / Surface & Coatings Technology 288 (2016) 814

et al. [13] pointed out that coating W powders with Ni alloy could obtain
a more homogeneous microstructure of CuW composites. Some
researchers [14,15] have also reported the method of plating Cu on
some metals and ceramics by electroless plating method, and found
that the properties of composites could improve a lot. Though
some researches have been reported to fabricate CuW composites
with electroless plating method to obtain full densication and
high properties, relatively less attention has been paid to the interfacial
bond between Cu and W and the mechanism of physical properties
enhancement. And it is not clear how the W powders with different
modications can transform to the differences in interfacial bond and
microstructure affecting the physical properties. Therefore, in order to
clarify the dependence of physical properties on interfacial bond and
microstructure of CuW composites, W powders have been modied
using electroless plating method to get Cu@W composite powders
with different Cu content in the coating in this work. The effect of W
powders with different modications on interfacial bond between Cu
and W has been investigated. The emphasis has also been placed on
microstructure evolution and properties enhancement of CuW
composites as the coating's Cu content increases.

used to obtain the average grain sizes of the Cu coating grains through
Scherrer equation. The exact Cu contents of Cu@W composite powders
were measured by inductively coupled plasma (ICP, Optima 4300DV,
USA). The morphologies of Cu@W composite powders and microstructure of CuW composites were observed using eld emission scanning
electron microscope (FE-SEM, Quanta-250, USA). The density of CuW
composites was measured based on the Archimedes principle. The
thermal conductivity of CuW composites can be calculated based
on the equation K = Cp, where K, , and Cp represent thermal
conductivity, thermal diffusivity, bulk density and specic heat of the
sample, respectively. The thermal diffusivity was measured using
laser ash apparatus (Netzsch, LFA 457, German) in Ar atmosphere at
room temperature. The coefcient of thermal expansion was measured
(DIL 402C, NETZSCH, Germany) in Ar atmosphere from room temperature to 350 C. The bending strength (U.S. MT810 Ceramic test system)
was measured with three-point bending method with 20 mm
6.25 mm 5.25 mm bars at a crosshead speed of 0.5 mm/min. Vickers
hardness (430 SVD) was measured on polished sections by Vickers
indentation with 1 kg load and holding 15 s. The reported bending
strength and Vickers hardness were the average value of three
measurements.

2. Experimental procedure
3. Results and discussion
2.1. Synthesis of Cu-coated W composite powders
3.1. Preparation of Cu@W composite powders
In this work, W powders with average size of 10 m were provided
by Xiamen Golden Egret Special Loy Co. Ltd. in China. Before electroless
plating process, the W powders were washed with HCl (37 wt.%) and
NaOH (30 wt.%) for 30 min, respectively, and then washed using deionized water. After that, electroless plating process was carried out. The
compositions of plating solution and reaction conditions are shown in
Table 1. The pH value in the bath was measured using an online pH
monitoring instrument, and was maintained by constantly adding
NaOH solution using a peristaltic pump. The temperature during electroless plating process was controlled using a constant temperature water
bath. After electroless plating process, Cu-coated W (Cu@W for short)
composite powders were washed using deionized water for more than
3 times and dried by vacuum freezing dried machine. The Cu contents
of the coatings in Cu@W composite powders were controlled by varying
the cupric sulfate contents in plating bath. 5Cu@W, 10Cu@W, 15Cu@W
and 20Cu@W composite powders represent that the coatings' Cu
contents are 5 wt.%, 10 wt.%, 15 wt.% and 20 wt.% Cu, respectively. The
Cu@W composite powders and some pure Cu powders (sphere, average
particle size is ~10 m, provided by Alfa company) were mixed by ball
milling with speed of 150 rpm for 3 h to get 20 wt.% CuW mixtures,
which were then cold pressed into green compacts. Additionally, pure
W powders and Cu powders were also mixed together to prepare
20 wt.% CuW compact for comparison. Finally, compacts were sintered
at 950 C100 MPa2 h by hot-press sintering.
2.2. Properties measurement and microstructure characterization
The phases of Cu@W composite powders and average grain sizes of
Cu coating were analyzed using X-ray diffraction (XRD, Ultima III,
Japan). The scanning range of 3095 and scanning speed of 4/min
were used to analyze the main phases of the composite powders. A
slow scanning speed of 0.24/min with the same scanning range was

Table 1
Bath compositions and reaction conditions for electroless plating.
Chemical

Function

Concentration

CuSO45H2O
KNaC4O6H44H2O
(C5H4N)2
HCHO

Source Cu
Complexing agent
Stabilizing agent
Reducing agent

20 g/L
50 g/L
5.0 mL/L
25 mL/L

Fig. 1 shows the morphologies and phase analysis of Cu@W composite

powders. It can be seen from Fig. 1(b) that the surfaces of W powders are
densely coated with Cu and the Cu@W composite powders are obviously
coarser than raw W powders (as shown in Fig. 1(a)). The inset image in
Fig. 1(b) shows that W powders are tightly coated with Cu.
The phase analysis of Cu@W composite powders in Fig. 1(c) shows
that only W and Cu phases can be identied, indicating that the plating
Cu in the Cu@W composite powders is pure. The Cu diffraction data
in the range of 4155 are shown in the inset image. As can be seen,
the intensities of Cu diffraction peaks increase with increases in the Cu
content of the coating, the sizes of Cu grains get bigger leading the
stronger XRD diffraction intensity. Second, the coating's increased Cu
contents in the Cu@W composite powders are also responsible for the
stronger XRD intensities.
The thickness of Cu layer and average size of Cu grains for Cu@W
composite powders are shown in Fig. 2(a). It shows that the thickness
of Cu layer increases from 1.4 m to 3.6 m, and the average grain size
increases from ~ 100 nm to ~ 1 m. Fig. 2(b) shows the ICP of Cu@W
composite powders with different Cu contents. It can be seen that the
experimental measured Cu contents are slightly lower than the
theoretical values. The gap between the experimental and theoretical
values may be due to some Cu solution splashing during the reaction
process. However, the gap is less than 1%, indicating that Cu@W composite powders with accurate Cu contents could be obtained by electroless
plating method.
The electroless plating process could perform on a catalytic surface
with certain pH and temperature. The electroless Cu deposition process
with formaldehyde as reduction agent proceeds in the reaction:
Cu2 2HCHO 4OH Cu 2HCOO 2H2 O H2 :

The above reaction is composed of the oxidation of formaldehyde

and the reduction of copper ions. The oxidation of formaldehyde is
usually a catalytic reaction which occurs in the presence of catalytic
metals such as Au, Pd, and Cu. In this work, W powders are coated
with Cu without addition of catalytic metals, indicating that the deposited Cu act as a catalytic agent, the Cu deposition reaction increases the
thickness and grain size of the deposited Cu layer.

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P. Chen et al. / Surface & Coatings Technology 288 (2016) 814

Fig. 1. Characterizations of Cu@W composite powders: SEM of (a) raw W powders and (b) 20Cu@W; (c) XRD of Cu@W.

3.2. The physical properties of CuW composites

Fig. 3 displays the thermal and electrical properties of CuW
composites. It is obvious that both thermal and electrical conductivity
increase with increasing Cu content in the coating, while the CTE
increases slightly, and then decreases a lot. When 20Cu@W composite
powders are used to prepare CuW composites, the thermal and electrical
conductivity improve to the maximum value of 239 W/(mK) and

50.6%IACS, respectively, and CTE reaches the minimum value of

7.3 10 6 /K. These results suggest that modifying W powders
with Cu coating could effectively enhance the thermal and electrical
properties of CuW composites. It is well known that thermal and
electrical conduction occurs mainly through the electron transport
in metals, and the electron conduction preferentially occurs through
the Cu phase which has a higher conductivity than the W phase in
CuW composites. After W powders are coated with Cu, the Cu network

Fig. 2. The thickness of Cu layer and Cu grain size (a), and ICP (b) of Cu@W composite powders.

P. Chen et al. / Surface & Coatings Technology 288 (2016) 814

Fig. 3. Thermal and electrical properties of CuW composites as a function of coating Cu

contents.

structure could form in the CuW composites which is benecial for the
electron conduction. What's more, the enhanced interfacial bond also
improves the electron conduction efciency at the interface of Cu and W.
It is worth noting that the maximum value of thermal conductivity is
close to the theoretical value with the mode proposed by German et al.
[16] as follows:

Q comp



Q W Q Cu 4R4R2 R2


R Q Cu 12R Q W
:
3
3
RQ W 1 R Q Cu
2
2
2

11

with mixed W and Cu powders, there are a lot of pores as defects in

the sample which produce higher thermal expansion. At this moment
the defect of pores is the main factor affecting CTE of CuW composites.
After W powders are coated with 20 wt.% Cu, the relative density
increases resulting in fewer pores in the sample, the homogeneous
microstructure and strong bonding strength between Cu and W decrease
the CTE of the composite.
Fig. 4 displays the mechanical properties of CuW composites. It can
be seen that the amount of the coating's Cu content plays a signicant
role in enhancing the mechanical properties of CuW composites.
Both the bending strength and Vickers hardness increase with increasing
Cu content in the coating. The bending strength and Vickers hardness of
mixed CuW composites is just 391.9 MPa and 174 HV, respectively.
Compared with that, the bending strength and Vickers hardness reach
the highest values of 976.7 MPa and 224.8 HV, respectively, when
CuW composites are prepared with 20Cu@W composite powders. The
mechanical properties of CuW composites are sensitive to the defects
and interfacial bond strength. The defects such as pores are the origins
of fracture for composites while the strong interfacial bond inhibits the
crack propagation. Pores in the CuW composites usually result in
lower relative density and have a detrimental effect on the mechanical
properties of CuW composites. That is to say, coating W powders with
Cu contributes to the densication of CuW composites, which leads to
signicant improvement of bending strength and Vickers hardness.
Although Cu and W are negligible, there is still diffusion behavior
between them. Therefore, coating W powders with Cu makes the interfacial bond stronger, which also contributes to the increasing of bending
strength and Vickers hardness. So the improvement of mechanical
properties suggests that coating W powders with Cu favorsreducing
the defects and enhancing the interfacial bond in the composites,
which assure the effective load transfer from the Cu to W particles.
3.3. Mechanism of properties improvement for CuW composites

R 0:0113 1:58 VCu 1:83 VCu 3=2 1:06 VCu 3 , VCu is the Cu
volume fraction; Qcomp is the thermal conductivity of composites, QW
and QCu are the thermal conductivity of W and Cu, respectively. According
to the mode, the theoretical thermal conductivity of 20 wt.% CuW
composites is 240 W/(mK), and the maximum value of 239 W/(mK)
is very close to that when CuW composites are prepared with 20Cu@
W composite powders. It suggests that the ideal Cu network structure
has been obtained in this work to improve the thermal properties of
CuW composites.
The essence of CTE of metals is the vibration of the crystal lattice,
and there are many factors inuencing it, such as relative density,
components, homogeneity. When CuW composites are prepared

The relative density and density curves of CuW composites are

shown in Fig. 5. It can be seen that the relative density and density of
CuW composites increase greatly and reach the maximum values
of 97.7% and 15.3 g cm3, respectively, when 20Cu@W composite
powders are used to prepare CuW composites.
Due to the immiscibility between Cu and W, the densication of Cu
W composites only occurs through solid-state sintering which is strongly inuenced by the homogeneity of W powders and sinterability between Cu and W. When W and Cu powders are mixed together, the
low densication of CuW composites can be ascribed to two reasons.
First, the inhomogeneous distribution of W and Cu powders produces

Fig. 4. Mechanical properties of CuW composites as a function of coating Cu contents.

Fig. 5. Relative density and density of CuW composites as a function of coating Cu

contents.

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P. Chen et al. / Surface & Coatings Technology 288 (2016) 814

some pores which inhibit the mass transport of Cu and W atoms. It is

difcult to homogeneously mix W and Cu powders due to the high difference densities of W and Cu, so some W powders agglomerate together generating the bridge effect, while Cu cannot ll these pores. Second,
the main sintering modes for the traditional CuW composites are WW,
WCu and CuCu, which is hard to diffuse for WW and WCu at 950 C
due to their low sinterability. Therefore, it is difcult to densify CuW
composites with mixing W and Cu powders at low temperature. Compared with that, the high relative density of Cu-coated powder CuW
composites can be due to the homogeneous distribution of W powders
and improvement of sinterability between Cu and W. As W powders are
coated with Cu forming a core-shell structure, the bridge effect between
W powders can be eliminated to reduce pores in the compact of CuW
composites. During the heating stage, the Cu diffuses easily from the
bulk to the surface of the composite powders, and the composite powders
sinter together with Cu necks growing. So the mass transport of Cu and W
atoms will be more rapid. It is reported that the activation energy for W
surface self-diffusion decreases from 300 to 87 kJ/mol as W is coated
with Ni [9]. So similar to that, the Cu coating of W powders is also benecial to promote the self-diffusion of W atoms. Additionally, the main
sintering mode of CuW composites in this case turns to CuCu, which
lowers the total interface energy. What's more, the sinterability of nano
Cu particles at the surfaces of Cu@W composite powders is much higher
than that of micro Cu powders, which promotes the mass transport and
solid-state diffusion of CuCu. This improvement in the mass transport
also leads to densication of CuW composites. Thus, the rapid mass
transport and sintering mode conversion enhance the densication of
CuW composites. According to above results and analysis, Cu coating
W powders can greatly improve the densication of CuW composites.
Consequently, the densied CuW composites decrease the pores, and
provide a precondition for the excellent physical properties.
Fig. 6 shows the microstructures of CuW composites. The gray
particles are W powders while the black one is Cu. It can be seen that
there are many pores in the mixed CuW composites in Fig. 6(a), and
many Cu pools and W agglomerations indicate that the homogeneous
distribution of W powders is poor. In contrast to that, few pores exist
in Cu-coated powder CuW composites in Fig. 6(b), the W powders
are distributed homogeneously and no obvious Cu pools or W agglomerations exist. Due to the large density difference between Cu and W, it
is impossible to distribute homogeneously Cu and W powders. Therefore, W agglomerations and Cu agglomerations form easily, leading to
the pores and Cu pools in the microstructure. These agglomerations
and pores are bad for the atom diffusion resulting in low densication
and weak interfacial bonding strength. As a result, these pores degrade
greatly the relative density and physical properties of CuW composites. Consequently, the microstructural comparisons of mixed and Cucoated powder CuW composites suggest that coating W powders
with CU is benecial for the densication and homogeneous distribution of W and Cu grains.

Fig. 7 clearly shows the different fracture morphologies of CuW

composites. As shown in Fig. 7 (a), the main fracture way of mixed
CuW composites is W particles falling, and the surfaces of W particles
are smooth. In contrast to that, the dominant fracture ways of Cu-coated
powder CuW composites are W particle fracture and Cu ductility
fracture, as shown in Fig. 7(b). The surfaces of W particles are covered
with Cu network structure and the Cu dimples contain some small W
particles, as shown in the inset image in Fig. 7(b). Similar results have
also been observed in refs. [1719].
The pores in Fig. 7(a) are almost the same size as the W particles,
which are responsible for W particles falling. The smooth surfaces of
W particles in inset image in Fig. 7(a) indicate that there is little interdiffusion between Cu and W. Due to the poor wettability between Cu and
W, there is high contact angle and low diffusion coefcient at 950 C, so
it is difcult for Cu and W to interdiffuse sufciently. It is worth noting
that that there are obvious gaps at the interface between Cu and W, as
shown with arrows in the inset image in Fig. 7(a). There are two reasons
to explain it. The interfacial bonding strength between Cu and W is
weak due to little diffusion, and it can also be ascribed to the large difference of coefcient of thermal expansion between Cu (17.6 106/K)
and W (4.5 106/K). The thermal mismatch between Cu and W
results in large thermal stress within composites as cooling from processing temperature to room temperature. When the thermal stress is
higher than the interfacial bonding strength between Cu and W, it will
produce gaps at the interfaces of Cu and W [11]. Therefore, the low
physical properties of mixed CuW composites can also be ascribed to
the gaps between Cu and W. However, when W powders are coated
with Cu, the interface between Cu and W is perfect without any gaps,
and the W particle fracture indicates that the interfacial strength
between Cu and W is higher than the W particles' fracture strength. The
Cu network structure at the surface of W powder in Fig. 7(b) suggests
that there is sufcient interdiffusion between Cu and W leading to strong
bonding strength between Cu and W grains, which are benecial for the
electron conduction and stress transfer. Therefore, from the fracture
morphologies of CuW composites, the Cu@W composite powders
favor promoting the interdiffusion and interfacial bonding strength
between Cu and W, resulting in high thermal, electrical and mechanical
properties of CuW composites.
3.3.1. Effect of interfacial bonding strength on the properties enhancement
As shown in part I in Figs. 3, 4 and 5, the properties of CuW
composites increase greatly. The factors that mainly affect the properties of CuW composites are interfacial bonding strength and homogeneous microstructure in this part. As mentioned previously, the poor
sinterability between Cu and W results in weak bonding strength at
the interface of CuW. As can be seen from Figs. 6 and 7, the pores at
the interface of CuW have a deleterious effect on the electron conduction and stress transfer. What's worse, the poor homogeneity of W and
Cu grains results in many W agglomerations (high WW contiguity)

Fig. 6. Microstructures of CuW composites prepared with: (a): mixed W and Cu powders; (b): 20Cu@W composite powders.

P. Chen et al. / Surface & Coatings Technology 288 (2016) 814

13

Fig. 7. Fracture morphologies of CuW composites prepared with: (a): mixed W and Cu powders; (b): 20Cu@W composite powders.

and Cu pools, which also increases the electron scattering and lowers
the thermal and electrical conductivity as well as the mechanical properties of CuW composites. After W powders are coated with Cu, W and
Cu grains distribute homogeneously resulting in the formation of the
ideal Cu network structure in the CuW composites. What's more
important, there is excellent interface between Cu and W, as shown in
Fig. 8. It can be seen that W grains have good contact with Cu without
obvious defects at the interface, and W and Cu are bonded tightly
together which is benecial for the electron transportation and stress
transfer. What's more, the expansion of Cu grains could be effectively
restrained by W grains resulting in low coefcient of thermal expansion.

3.3.2. Effect of coating's Cu content on the properties enhancement

As shown in part II in Figs. 3 and 4, the properties of CuW
composites increase continuously with increases in the coating's Cu
content increasing. The relative densities of Cu-coated powder CuW
composites in the part II are all higher than 97%, and the microstructural
homogeneity is getting better with coating Cu contents increasing. As
shown in Fig. 6, few Cu pools appear in the Cu-coated powder CuW
composites. Considering the effect of a homogeneous microstructure
on the properties of composites [3,13], it could form a Cu network structure to achieve uent electron transportation and crack deection in the
composites. So the Cu network structure becomes perfect with increasing
Cu content in the coating, resulting in better physical properties of CuW
composites. What's more, the difference between the added pure Cu and
coating Cu by electroless plating may also inuence the properties of
CuW composites. Because the Cu grain size by electroless plating is
much smaller than that of the added pure Cu powders, the mechanical
properties will be improved with the renement of grains according to
the HallPetch formula. So with the coating's increasing Cu content,
there are more Cu grains with small size in the CuW composites leading
to higher mechanical properties.

4. Conclusions
This work has provided a comprehensive study about the effect
of interfacial bond and homogeneous microstructure on the physical
properties of CuW composites. The detailed conclusions are as follows.
(1) W powders were uniformly coated with highly puried Cu by
electroless plating method. The coating's Cu content could be
adjusted accurately from 5 wt.% to 20 wt.% and the thickness of
Cu layer increased from 1.4 m to 3.6 m. The deposited Cu
acted as a catalytic agent resulting in increasing the thickness
and grain size of the deposited Cu layer.
(2) With the coating's Cu content increasing, the microstructure
of CuW composites become homogeneous, the thermal and
electrical conductivity, as well as mechanical properties increased
greatly, and the CTE decreased. When 20Cu@W composite powders were used to prepare Cu-coated powder CuW composites,
the physical properties reached the optimal values, which the
thermal and electrical conductivity improved to the maximum
values of 239 W/(mK) and 50.6%IACS, respectively, and CTE was
the minimum value of 7.3 106/K, the bending strength and
Vickers hardness reached the highest values of 976.7 MPa and
224.8 HV, respectively.
(3) The coating's Cu content on the W powders achieved homogeneous microstructure of CuW composites and had a positive
effect on improving physical properties. The ideal Cu network
structure formation and strong interfacial bond between W and
Cu improved the efciency of electron transportation and stress
transfer resulting in the high thermal, electrical and mechanical
properties.

Acknowledgment
This work has been supported by the National Natural Science
Foundation of China (51572208) and the 111 Project (B13035).
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