Abstract:
Chemical etching is the controlled dissolution of material by contact with strong chemical
solution. The process can be applied to any material. The process applies a strong
chemical etchant solution to remove unwanted part in the material. It is basically a
corrosion-controlled process. Etching is the art of engraving with acid on metal. In hard
ground etching the plate, usually of copper or zinc, is given a thin coating or ground of
acid-resistant resin. This is sometimes smoked so that lines scratched through the resin
will be clearly visible. Chemical etching process has a long history and accepted one of
the important nontraditional machining processes during the last half century. The method
is widely applied to machine geometrically complex parts from thin and flat of any
material. It is also used to reduce weight of the materials. In this study, the chemical
etching of zinc samples has been studied in Ferric Chloride (FeC13) etchant at different
temperature and different concentration. This experiment was done at room temperature
condition. The beneficial aspects of zinc samples were revealed from the experiments
conducted. The depth of etch on the zinc samples were measured using outside
micrometer. The surfaces of zinc sample before and after the experiment were
characterized using Metallurgical Microscope. The plots of graphs obtained showed that
the depth of etch was increased as the temperature increased. The depth of etch also
increased as the concentration of FeC'3 increased.
