A brief feasibility study was performed to produce thermal spray coatings using gas atomized powders of Cu47Ti34-xZr11Ni8Six, where x=0 and 1. These alloys have previously been shown to be capable of forming metallic glasses having thick (1-2 cm) cross sections because they can be cooled from the melt at relatively low cooling rates (e.g., 100-102Ks-1). The properties of these metallic glasses include high strength, high elasticity and high fracture toughness. Amorphous plasma arc sprayed coatings were produced which were close in composition to the starting powders, and exhibited comparable glass transition and crystallization behavior. The amorphous structure of the as-sprayed coatings was used as a source for forming a range of partially devitrified and fully crystallized structures. The average hardness of the coatings increased from around 6 GPa to near 10 GPa as the degree of crystallization increased.

A study was performed to examine the effects of starting powder composition, substrate thermal conductivity, and substrate temperature on the composition and structure of individual Al-Cu-Fe splats formed during thermal spraying. The fraction of quasicrystalline phase which formed was found to depend on the chemistry and solidification history of the splats. Due to evaporative loss of Al during spraying, an initial powder composition higher in Al produced splats closer to the desired composition, which yielded more of the quasicrystalline phase. Deposition onto lower thermal conductivity surfaces resulted in an increase in the quasicrystalline phase, as did solidification onto higher temperature substrates.

Al-Cu-Fe quasicrystalline coatings, due to their high hardness and low friction coefficients, are potential candidates for improving the wear resistance of ductile materials. However, technological applications may be limited on account of their brittle nature. This study examines the effects of starting powder composition and thermal spray process parameters on the phase assemblage, microstructure, and tribological response of Al-Cu-Fe thermally sprayed coatings. It was found that the coatings fail by a delamination mechanism in unlubricated unidirectional sliding wear. Furthermore, the coatings produced by the high velocity oxy-fuel technique showed a very low coefficient of friction and wear rate.

The demand for highly continuous thermal spray deposition processing to gain manufacturing efficiency and enhanced control of deposition microstructure has driven the search for powder feedstocks that exhibit uniform flow behavior in pneumatic feeding devices even at low carrier gas flow ratios. This paper compares the continuous powder feeding characteristics of one type of feeding device for two different powder alloys fabricated by a representative set of powder processing methods, including spray dried, fused (cast) and crushed, and inert gas atomized. Powders were fabricated by both commercial vendors and Ames Laboratory processing equipment. The powder mass flow rate was found to depend directly on the apparent density of a specific powder type instead of the dry powder flowability, as initially expected.