Abstract
Statistical design-of-experiment studies of the thermal spraying of polymer powders are presented. Studies of the subsonic combustion (i.e., Flame) process were conducted in order to determine the quality and economics of polyester and urethane coatings. Thermally sprayed polymer coatings are of interest to several industries for anticorrosion applications, including the chemical, automotive, and aircraft industries. In this study, the coating design has been optimized for a site-specific application using Taguchi-type fractional-factorial experiments. Optimized coating designs are presented for the two powder systems. A substantial range of thermal processing conditions and their effect on the resultant polymer coatings is presented. The coatings were characterized by optical metallography, hardness testing, tensile testing, and compositional analysis. Characterization of the coatings yielded the thickness, bond strength, Knoop microhardness, roughness, deposition efficiency, and porosity. Confirmation testing was accomplished to verify the coating designs.
