Erosion performance of suspension plasma spray thermal barrier coatings - A comparison with state of art coatings

Suspension plasma spray (SPS) thermal barrier coatings are currently at an early stage of industrial adoption. There remain questions about the performance of SPS columnar coatings under different engine environmental conditions as it may influence which established engine coatings can be replaced by SPS coatings. One particular area of concern has been the erosion resistance of SPS coatings.In this study a columnar SPS coating has been evaluated against three types of state of art air plasma spray coatings: conventional porous coating, high porosity coating and dense vertically cracked coating. Air-jet erosion testing was performed on coatings at a glancing angle of 30 degrees and with direct impact at 90 degrees. Coatings have been ranked according to their mass loss per unit erodent mass. Coatings were also evaluated for their microstructure, porosity content, hardness, and fracture toughness. The erosion damage created during testing has also been investigated using electron microscopy to observe the damage mechanism. The results of this study demonstrate that SPS coatings can outperform porous APS coatings in erosion resistance and could be considered a match for dense vertically cracked coatings. The SPS columnar coatings have shown a decreasing erosion rate with exposure time that suggest the influence of surface roughness on initial erosion behaviour.

Automated summary

This study evaluates the erosion resistance of suspension plasma spray coatings compared to other air plasma spray coatings. The results show that suspension plasma spray coatings outperform porous coatings and can be considered as an alternative to dense coatings.