1. Surface preparation and conditioning

In some cases, preparation simply involves decontaminating the surface, removing contaminants by cleaning or degreasing, to give it maximum reactivity, for example, to improve the adhesion of a deposit. In other cases (oxidized parts or parts coated with corrosion products), it is necessary to remove material to expose the surface (also referred to as "roughening"), in order to give it the desired appearance or properties (polished, restored, passivated surface, etc.), without altering the base metal.

Surface preparation and conditioning processes depend not only on the nature (composition, size and geometry, surface condition, etc.) of the part to be treated, but also on the desired objective. For certain alloys, such as stainless steels, it is often recommended to carry out a passivation treatment after pickling, in order to "rebuild" the passive protective film...