Corrosion Resistance of Chromium Coating by Magnetron Sputtering on 316L Stainless Steel Bipolar Plates of Fuel Cell

A layer of chromium coating was deposited on 316L stainless steel by magnetron sputtering method. Electrochemical method was employed to investigate corrosion resistance of the coating in 0.5 mol·L-1 H2SO4 solution. The results show that the chromium coating was uniform and dense, which increased the corrosion potential of the stainless steel obviously, and decreased the corrosion current densities of coating from 7.62 μA·cm-2 to 0.06 μA·cm-2. The corrosion resistance of the stainless steel was improved remarkable by the Cr coating. The coating was stable when soaking in corrosive solution for a long time.