Cold formable Magnesium alloy combined with forming stable and self-lubricating anti-corrosion powder coating

Magnesium has a significantly lower density than steel or even aluminium and is therefore predestined as a lightweight construction material. Conventional magnesium alloys, however, are difficult or impossible to form at room temperature and corrode relatively easy. This paper will give an overview about the development of a material system, which consists of a novel formable magnesium alloy that is provided with an effective corrosion protection coating. The corrosion protection is to be realized in the form of a novel, forming stable powder coating, which can be applied in the coil coating process directly after sheet production. In order to improve the tribological properties during forming, additional additives are to be added to the powder coating formulation to positively influence the coefficient of friction. Ideally, additional lubricants can be completely dispensed with while maintaining high flexibility and adhesive strength of the coating layer. Within this paper, first results concerning tribological and forming behaviour of the new lightweight material system will be given as the example of strip drawing and cupping tests at room temperature under lubricated and dry conditions. For the benchmark, the results are compared with those obtained using a commercially available AZ31 Mg alloy to show the potential of this novel lightweight structural system.