Abstract
The precondition of a cost efficient wire arc spraying process is an ideal process setup according to the wire material. Modern power supplies are equipped with electronic control circuits to ensure stable arc conditions at the wire tips. This is necessary for high quality wire arc sprayed coatings. The key factors to achieve this are the arc energy and fluid mechanics as well. By the use of a PID controller to maintain set spray parameters, it is possible to reduce the spray voltage down to 15 V for zinc as feedstock material. Furthermore temperature dependent parameter fluctuations can be compensated with the electronic controller, while working at maximum capacity with one hundred percent duty cycle. The paper discusses the influence of a new power supply with regard to the process stability and the enhancement of former power supply based process limitation as well as the operator guidance.
