Cold atmospheric plasma spraying is used to produce thin coatings of copper and tin between 20-80 μm thickness for use in diffusion soldering. This study presents an alternative process to apply composite solders directly onto power electronic bare dies. The formation of intermetallic phases may be promoted by the homogeneous distribution of the Cu and Sn particles as they are presented not in a layered structure but as a pseudo alloy within the coating. The Cu and Sn powder is mixed in situ using two powder conveyors, enabling adjustable mix ratios. The presented approach has been shown to produce a homogeneous particle distribution within the coating. Furthermore, preliminary experiments indicate the feasibility of the technology for applications in diffusion soldering.

Plasma jets for thermal spraying are strongly affected in a negative sense by the interaction with the relatively static surrounding atmosphere, particularly at atmospheric spray conditions. Turbulences at the jet fringes arise resulting in entrained cold gas, in slowing and cooling down of the jet and in causing eventually its disintegration. All means suppressing or delaying this phenomenon, called cold gas entrainment, help to improve the interaction of plasma and spray material and hence lead to better product quality and higher deposition efficiency of the process. To observe the cold gas entrainment, to investigate the thermal and kinetic properties of DC plasma jets at different operating conditions and to study the effect of plasma source and powder injection modifications a diagnostic equipment with Schlieren optics, enthalpy probe and mass spectrometry was installed. By modification of the internal and external anode nozzle contours and also by application of a shroud nozzle around the plasma jet exit encouraging results with reduced penetration of cold ambient air into the jet could be obtained.

Polymeric substrates must be effectively cooled during plasma spraying to limit detrimental effects due to heat flow from the plasma jet. Even with the use of auxiliary cooling systems, however, some polymer substrates can undergo superficial modifications caused by particle heating at impact. This paper deals with chemical modifications in PET as a function of surrounding atmospheres during plasma processing. It also explains how aluminum coating adhesion was determined using tensile tests.

By means of Schlieren photography, enthalpy probe, mass spectrometry and the particle measuring system DPV 2000 the influence of the internal and external anode nozzle and torch geometry, on plasma jet quality for atmospheric plasma spraying was investigated. It turned out that there is a strong geometrical effect of the inner contour and that with a proper expansion of the hot core of the plasma jet a considerable improvement of the melting and deposition quality can be obtained. Also the outer torch contour is of influence on the spray process because it controls the formation and the intensity of turbulence and the interaction of the plasma jet with its surrounding and hence the cold gas entrainment.

A kinetic metallization technique, which is one of the cold spraying systems, has been studied as a new coating system for metallic bond coats of thermal barrier coatings for components used in hot section of advanced gas turbines. In this study, in-situ residual stresses in atmospheric plasma sprayed yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ) top coating with two different bond coat spraying systems, deposited by a low pressure plasma spraying and a cold spraying, were evaluated and compared by thermal cycle tests. From the results of 1st thermal cycle, in the case of the plasma sprayed bond coat, a tensile residual stress was observed at the elevated temperature up to 400°C. Relaxation of the residual stress was started beyond 400°C. On the other hand, the gradual increase of tensile residual stress was observed up to 1000 °C in the case of cold sprayed bond coat. In addition, transition behaviors of residual stress between plasma sprayed and cold sprayed coatings were varied in 3-thermal cycles.

This paper investigates the mechanical properties of plasma-sprayed Al 2 O 3 -TiO 2 coatings. Micro and nano powders were deposited on hot and cold substrates under different conditions using atmospheric and vacuum plasma spraying. The coatings were then characterized based on microstructure, hardness, phase composition, abrasive wear rate, and adhesion strength. It is observed that Al 2 O 3 -TiO 2 layers are very dependent on the coating system, powder form, and spray parameters used. The layers sprayed with nanopowder in a vacuum were found to have the best combination of properties. Paper includes a German-language abstract.

Tungsten and its alloys are promising candidates for protecting plasma-facing components in fusion reactors such as tokamaks. However, processing is complicated by tungsten’s brittleness, CTE mismatch with copper and steel, susceptibility to grain growth and oxidation above 500 °C, and poor weldability. Given these factors, attention is shifting from conventional methods to powder and additive techniques. In this work, two technologies are employed for consolidation of W and WCr layers: cold kinetic spraying and inductively-coupled plasma spraying. Both methods overcome production challenges by depositing plasma-facing layers directly on structural parts, without the need for joining and the risk of oxidation. The properties of W and WCr coatings obtained by both methods are assessed by means of SEM, XRD, and mechanical and thermal analysis.

Atmospheric plasma spray parameters were developed for a three-cathode torch with a high-velocity nozzle and MCrAlY powders of different particle size fractions. The main objectives of the work are to achieve bond coats with low oxygen content and porosity. Other goals are achieving sufficient surface roughness at high deposition rates and efficiencies. The oxidation behavior of the sprayed coatings was characterized by thermal gravimetric analyses and isothermal heat treatments.

In addition to the proper functional properties, the adhesive strength represents one of the key criteria for industrial use of thermally sprayed coatings. Since conventional thermal spraying processes are almost carried out exclusively in air atmosphere, this leads to the oxidation of the particles and of interfaces within the coatings. As a result, conventional thermally sprayed metallic and metal-ceramic coatings are characterized by heterogeneous microstructures with interlamellar oxide fringes at the interfaces between individual splats and also between the coating and the substrate. This has a decisive influence on the bond strength and on the wear and corrosion protection properties of thermally sprayed coatings. The aim of this study is to present the potentials of thermal spraying processes carried out in a mixture of monosiliane and an inert gas at ambient pressure as an alternative to the known vacuum spraying process in order to prevent oxidation during the coating process. Using the example of arcsprayed coatings, it is demonstrated that the extremely low oxygen partial pressure in the silane-doped medium leads to coatings free of oxide seams with a reduced porosity and substantially enhanced properties.

A modified Laval-like-contour for a convergent-divergent nozzle is presented for the Atmospheric Plasma Spraying (APS). The influence of the nozzle design on the thermal and deposition efficiency as well as on the arc voltage fluctuations and the sound level of the plasma torch are investigated and compared with former investigations. The improvements of the quality of DC-Plasma sprayed Al 2 O 3 coatings by the nozzle design is shown by the coating porosity, adhesive and breakdown strength. A 2D-model presents the gas dynamics inside the nozzle. The intention of this study is to promote the industrial application of convergent-divergent nozzles for the APS in conjunction with the optimisation of the plasma gas dynamics.

For the application of thermally sprayed titanium coatings, the high oxygen affinity and tendency to nitride formation in the presence of nitrogen represents a major challenge. Consequently, thermally sprayed titanium coatings are usually applied by cold gas spraying, vacuum plasma spraying and shrouded spraying processes. Nevertheless, the formation of oxides cannot be completely avoided with these methods. The pre-sent study demonstrates an alternative coating strategy for the application of oxide and nitride free thermally sprayed titanium coatings. Thereby, the previous limitations are overcome by transferring the coating process into a silane-doped argon gas environment to achieve an extremely low oxygen and nitrogen partial pressure. Thus, the created titanium coatings are oxide and nitride free and have an extremely low porosity. Moreover, by transferring of the corundum blasting process to this environment, the native oxide layer on the substrate surface can be removed and its reformation is suppressed. This results in full material bonding conditions with extremely high adhesive tensile strengths.

Low pressure cold spraying is an attractive technique for onsite metal coating fabrication due to its compactness and portability. However, the bonding strength of the coating prepared by low pressure cold spraying is generally low, which restricts the further applications in engineering and industrial fields. To improve the bonding strength, pre-treatment on substrate surface can be an effective procedure. In this study, a low-temperature plasma treatment was applied to a pretreatment technique, and the effect of the treatment on particle bonding was compared with that of a laser treatment. Copper coatings on aluminum and copper substrates were selected and studied as basic metal materials. The SEM observation results show that the particle adhesion rate significantly increases by the laser and plasma treatments, due to the removal of the native oxide films on the substrates. The particle bonding on the plasma-treated substrate reveals better interfacial adhesion with less gap compared with the laser-treated one. The pre-treatment by low-temperature plasma can be an attractive technique to assist the cold spraying process due to the oxide removal ability and no thermal effect which can apply a wide range of materials.

Nanostructured YSZ is expected to exhibit a high strain tolerability due to its low Young’s modulus and consequently high durability. In this study, a porous YSZ as the thermal barrier coating was deposited by plasma spraying using an agglomerated nanostructured YSZ powder on a Ni-based superalloy Inconel 738 substrate with a cold-sprayed nanostructured NiCrAlY as the bond coat. The heat treatment in Ar atmosphere was applied to the cold-sprayed bond coat before deposition of YSZ. The isothermal oxidation and thermal cycling tests were applied to examine failure modes of plasma-sprayed nanostructured YSZ. The results showed that YSZ coating was deposited by partially melted YSZ particles. The nonmelted fraction of spray particles retains the porous nanostructure of the starting powder into the deposit. YSZ coating exhibits a bimodal microstructure consisting of nanosized particles retained from the powder and micro-columnar grains formed through the solidification of the melted fraction in spray particles. The oxidation of the bond coat occurs during the heat treatment in Ar atmosphere. The uniform oxide at the interface between the bond coat and YSZ can be formed during isothermal test. The cracks were observed at the interface between TGO/BC or TGO/YSZ after thermal cyclic test. However, the failure of TBCs mainly occurred through spalling of YSZ within YSZ coating. The failure characteristics of plasma-sprayed nanostructured YSZ are discussed based on the coating microstructure and formation of TGO on the bond coat surface.

In this study, MCrAlY-Al 2 O 3 composite powders were produced by ball milling and deposited by plasma, HVOF, and cold spraying. The results show that Al 2 O 3 fractions can be well controlled using composite powder due to non-preferential impact debonding of the matrix and Al 2 O 3 . The microstructure of spray powders is well retained in HVOF and cold-sprayed coatings due to the unmelted or partially molten condition of the spray particles. In the case of plasma-sprayed coatings, however, most Al 2 O 3 particles segregate at lamellar interfaces, forming a continuous oxide scale on the splat. The cold-spray coatings exhibit the highest hardness due to the work hardening effect of kinetic deposition.

When spraying is conducted in the ambient atmosphere, the entrainment of air cools down the plasma jet and affects its expansion. It may also cause the oxidation or the chemical decomposition of the sprayed materials. Inert Plasma Spraying (IPS), generally conducted in argon atmospheres, prevents these phenomena. However, the main drawbacks of IPS in comparison with air plasma spraying are the capital and apparating costs. To reduce the latter by 25 to 30%, nitrogen atmospheres may be used as a substitute for the conventional argon atmosphere. This paper presents a study in which titanium carbide and niobium powders were sprayed in argon and nitrogen atmospheres. Cryogenic cooling of the substrate was used during the spray process. This helps to maintain a low temperature in the chamber, produces thick coatings and allows the use of substrate materials that are sensitive to heat. The adhesion, roughness and microstructure of the coatings produced in both atmospheres are compared as well as their nitrogen content.

In this study, copper coatings are deposited on polyacetal substrates by low-power microwave plasma spraying and the coating formation mechanism is investigated. In the initial formation of the coating, molten copper particles are embedded on the substrate, creating conditions for excellent bonding as confirmed by adhesion strength measurements exceeding 40 MPa. The study also shows that adding hydrogen to the argon working gas improves oxide reduction, resulting in copper coatings with volume resistivity as low as 0.049 µΩm.

Iron based coatings have recently gained much attention as they have favorable mechanical, frictional, and corrosion properties. The coatings possessed a high content of iron borides are particularly valuable for satisfying engineering needs. Boron and iron form two major boride phases, FeB and Fe2B, with different mechanical and thermal properties. Orthorhombic boride FeB is considered to be viable candidate to enhance the surface hardness and wear resistance of components, since it has high hardness. Producing of such coating by cold spray method is considered to be an alternative for boronizing method which is a conventional thermochemical surface hardening process. In this work, the crushed ferroboron (FeB) powders of Fe-17.9B-0.4C-1.6Si-0.3Al (wt. %) were deposited onto low carbon steel substrate by cold spraying. However, low and high pressure cold spraying allowed depositing very thin and single layer on the substrate, due to the intrinsic brittleness of the powder. Therefore, several contents of Al, Ni and Fe metallic powder and their combinations were added to FeB powder to obtain thick coating via cold spray processes. Post heat treated coatings at a temperature of 700 °C resulted in increase of the hardness, possibly the formation of hard phases such as intermetallic compound.

Surface morphology of MCrAlY bond coats is one of the factors that affect the oxidation behavior and the thermal stability of thermal barrier coatings. In the present study, the isothermal oxidation behavior of cold sprayed MCrAlY bond coat was investigated at three surface conditions: as-sprayed, polished and shot-peened conditions. The MCrAlY bond coat with sputters adhered weakly on the surface prepared by low-pressure plasma spraying was also employed. The above four types of surface conditions were employed to investigate the effect of the surface morphologies of MCrAlY (M=NiCo, Ni) bond coats on their oxidation behavior. MCrAlYs with the compositions of Ni20Cr10AlY and Ni23Co20Cr8.5Al5.0Ta0.6Y were employed for bond coat deposition. Cold-sprayed Ni20Cr10AlY exhibited a higher oxidation rate than that of the cold-sprayed Ni23Co20Cr8.5Al5.0Ta0.6Y bond coats. After 10 hrs oxidation, the TGO on the as-cold-sprayed bond coat surface was merely constituted by Al 2 O 3 , while the TGO on the bond coat surface attached with sputters was composed of Al 2 O 3 and spinel. After 500 hrs oxidation, Cr 2 O 3 and porous spinel appeared in the TGO on the two surfaces of as-cold-sprayed bond coat. The growth of Ni/Cr-oxides was attributed to the Al depletion. The content of spinel on cold-sprayed NiCrAlY decreased after shot-peening.

This paper presents the numerical simulation of the plasma flow into a dense atmosphere. The plasma generation is performed by the simple model developed by Eichert. Two models are exposed to take in account the arc fluctuation inside the anode. They permit us to simulate plasma puffs convected into the flow. The aim of this study is to compare these two models with experiments and to determine which one is the most relevant.

The most recent increase in turbine entry temperature (TET) can be obtained by the use of Thermal Barrier Coatings (TBCs) on cooled hot section components. The TBC systems are comprised of Ni-based super-alloy substrate which provides certain mechanical properties and blade geometry consisting of a ceramic top coat with low thermal conductivity applied to a metallic bond coat resulting in a significant temperature drop across the coating. The bond coat provides oxidation resistance and adherence of the top coat to the substrate. In this study different bond coat layers were applied on carbon steel substrates which were covered by yttria stabilized zirconia (YSZ) as a top coat layer using atmospheric plasma spray technique (APS). Al-12%Si and Al 99% were deposited by cold gas dynamic spray technique (CGDS) while Ni-5%Al layer was deposited by high velocity oxy fuel technique (HVOF). Heat treatment was performed on the samples under controlled atmosphere for 15 hrs. The microstructure and micro hardness of as sprayed and after heat treatment samples were investigated. Adhesion strength for top coat / bond coat interface and bond coat / substrate interface were investigated. The residual stresses for as sprayed and after heat treatment was estimated by XRD measurement on the top coat layer with different bond coat material. The results indicate that the adhesion strength either for as sprayed or after heat treatment was enhanced using this new bond coat materials compared to the traditionally as deposited Ni Co Cr Al Y bond coat material.