Thin Solid Films 450 (2004) 282289

Effects of spray parameters on the microstructure and property of Al2O3 coatings sprayed by a low power plasma torch with a novel hollow cathode
Chang-Jiu Li*, Bo Sun
State Key Laboratory for Mechanical Behavior of Materials, Welding Research Institute, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Xian Jiaotong University, Xian, Shaanxi 710049, PR China Received 22 January 2003; received in revised form 21 October 2003; accepted 14 November 2003

Abstract Al2O3 coating is deposited using a low power plasma torch with a novel hollow cathode through axial powder injection under a plasma power up to several kilowatts. The effects of the main processing parameters including plasma arc power, operating gas flow and spray distance on particle velocity during spraying, and the microstructure and property of the coating are investigated. The microstructure of the Al2 O3 coating is examined using optical microscopy and X-ray diffraction analysis. The property of the coating is characterized by dry rubber wheel abrasive wear test. The velocity of in-flight particle is measured using a velocityy temperature measurement system for spray particle based on thermal radiation from the particle. The dependency of the microstructure and property of the coating on spray particle conditions are examined by comparing the particle velocity, and microstructure and abrasive wear weight loss of subsequent coating deposited by low power plasma spray with those of the coating by conventional plasma spray at a power one order higher. X-ray diffraction analysis of the coating revealed that Al2O3 particles during low power plasma spraying reach to sufficiently melting state prior to impact on the substrate with a velocity comparable to that in conventional plasma spraying. The experiment results have shown that processing parameters have significant influence on the particle conditions and performance of deposited Al2 O3 coating. The coating of comparable microstructure and properties to that deposited by conventional plasma spray can be produced under a power one order lower. From the present study, it can be suggested that a comparable coating can be produced despite plasma power level if the comparable particle velocity and molten state are achieved. 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Plasma spraying; Hollow cathode; Aluminum oxide; Coatings

1. Introduction Plasma spraying has been used to deposit various coatings of different performances such as wear, corrosion and heat resistance w15x. Typical applications of plasma-sprayed alumina coating are involved in wear resistance w6x, thermal barrier coatings w7x and biomedical w8x, electrically insulating w9x, etc. The features of the high temperature and energy density make it possible to deposit coatings of refractory materials, which are difficult to melt by other conventional thermal spray
*Corresponding author. Tel.: q86-29-82660970; fax: q86-2983237910. E-mail address: licj@mail.xjtu.edu.cn (C.-J. Li). 0040-6090/04/$ - see front matter doi:10.1016/j.tsf.2003.11.166

processes. The microstructure and properties of plasmasprayed coating generally depend on a great number of parameters, such as design of plasma torch, operating parameters including plasma arc power, plasma gases, spray distance and powder feed rate and so on. Deforming and spreading of melting particles on the impact on a substrate or a coating formed previously is mainly driven by the kinetic energy and thermal energy of inflight particle prior to impact. Therefore, it is generally considered that increasing the velocity and temperature of in-flight particle will lead to produce a dense coating with good cohesion between flattened particles in the coating and good adhesion between a coating and a substrate. Moreover, increasing plasma power is considered as the most effective method to increase velocity

2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

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and temperature of in-flight particles. As a result, many attempts have been made to increase plasma power level w10,11x and the power input into torch has been increased from 20 kW in the 1950s, through 40 kW in the 1960s to 80 kW in the 1970s w12x, and a high power plasma torch approximately 250 kW was developed in the mid-1980s w10x. A recent study on the lamellar bonding of plasmasprayed Al2O3 coating suggested that the cohesion between flattened particles in the coating would determine the properties of plasma-sprayed coating w13x. However, the lamellar bonding of plasma-sprayed Al2O3 coating evaluated using copper electroplating technique revealed that the effort to increase the bonding ratio between lamellar particles through the increase in plasma power is limited w14,15x. This effect is attributed to the fact that compared with the particle velocity the particle temperature plays a dominant role on the formation of the cohesion between flattened particles in the coating w1618x. With an increase in plasma power, both the temperature and velocity of plasma jet are increased simultaneously owing to the mechanical and electromagnetic pinching effects on plasma arc. Such effect leads to an increase in particle velocity and a decrease in the dwelling time of the particle in plasma jet inevitably. Therefore, the increase in the heating effect owing to jet temperature increase can only compensate the shortening of dwelling time of particles in plasma jet w19x. To obtain higher particle temperature and subsequently an improved lamellar cohesion, the concept of low velocity plasma spraying was proposed and a plasma torch with a nozzle in diameter larger than that of conventional plasma torch was developed w20x. Such design concept of plasma torch benefits the particle temperature owing to a long dwelling time of particles within relatively low velocity plasma jet. The experiment using such nozzle showed that a more uniform heating of particle was achieved and consequently the deposition efficiency as well as the cohesion of the coating were improved. Following such concept of the torch development, it could be considered that if particles can be sufficiently heated during plasma spraying, a good cohesion between flattened particles in the coating will be obtained under a low power level. Recent development in plasma spray torch showed that the coating can be deposited at a power less than 10 kW w21,22x. Our previous studies of micro-plasma spray of low-melting point materials of Cu w23x and nickel-based alloy w24x have confirmed that the coating of a dense microstructure and comparable properties to that formed by conventional plasma spray can be deposited under a much low power condition. Therefore, it can be proposed that a coating of comparable performance can be formed by plasma spraying despite plasma power level provided

Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the low power plasma torch with a novel hollow cathode.

the spray particles achieve comparable velocity and temperature. To improve heating of spray particle, the most effective method is to inject the powder along the axis of the plasma jet, which will lead to an increase in the dwelling time of particle in the hottest zones of plasma jet w25x. Following such concept high power plasma torches using axial powder injections have been developed w26,27x. Moreover, injection of particle through the central hole of a hollow cathode is generally regarded as a simple way in which the effective heating zone to spray particle expands from the plasma jet to the whole plasma arc and plasma jet w28,29x. However, the problems including the instability of plasma arc attached at the tip of hollow cathode, the shortness of cathode life and adhering of spray powder to the electrode at the exit of the cathode limit practical application of hollow cathode plasma torch w30x. In this article, a low power plasma torch with a novel hollow cathode was developed to spray refractory material such as ceramics and high-melting point metals at a low power level from approximately 2 to 4 kW. The performance of the torch to deposit Al2O3 coating was examined through the investigation of the influence of spray parameters on microstructure and abrasive wear of the coating. The comparison of spray particle conditions, the microstructure and property of subsequent coating was carried out between low power plasma spraying and conventional plasma spraying to prove the dependency of coating property on particle conditions. 2. Experimental procedures 2.1. Low power plasma spray torch Fig. 1 shows a schematic illustration of the low power plasma spray torch used in the present study. A vortex gas flow is established through gas passing through 8

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Table 1 Spray parameters for low power plasma spraying Plasma gas (Ar) Powder feed gas (Ar) Arc power (kW) Current (A) Voltage (V) Spray distance (mm) Pressure (MPa) Flow (lymin) Pressure (MPa) Flow (lymin) 0.5 2842 0.3 10 2.23.9 70110 3035 1045

holes drilled tangentially to the insulator wall to stabilize the cathode arc attachment and continuously moving anode arc spot to improve anode heating load. The hollow cathode made of two tungsten rings was soldered on a water-cooled electrical conducting rod of copper. The tungsten ring in a larger diameter acts as the cathode and plasma arc burns on the surface of the ring, while the inner tungsten ring acts as the powder injection port. The difference between the front planes of two rings along the axis ensures the plasma arc to burn at the outer tungsten ring. Consequently, the adhering of spray powder on the wall of the hollow tungsten can be eliminated because of the easy control of particle trajectory and the low temperature of the inner tungsten resulting from the cooling effect by powder carrier gas flow. The stability of plasma arc can be improved because the disturbance of the powder carrier gas to the plasma arc can be limited. Argon was used as both plasma operating and powder carrier gases. Table 1 shows the range of primary plasma parameters in spraying. Three spray parameters including plasma power, plasma gas flow and spray distance were changed to investigate the effect of those parameters on velocity of in-flight particle, the microstructure and property of subsequent Al2O3 coatings. 2.2. Materials and characterization Powder used was commercially available pure Al2O3, which had a particle size from 10 to 20 mm. A mild steel plate was used as a substrate, which was sandblasted prior to spraying. The velocity of in-flight particle was measured using a particle velocityytemperature measurement system developed based on the thermal radiation from spray particle. The system set-up and detailed description were given elsewhere w31x. The melting state of spray particle prior to impact on the substrate was examined based on the examination of the microstructure of the coating and phase constitution of Al2O3 coating. The cross-sectional microstructure of the Al2O3 coating was examined by optical microscopy. The phase structure of the coating was characterized by Xray diffraction (XRD) analysis. The property of the coating was characterized by abrasive wear weight loss using dry rubber wheel test

according to the ASTM-G6-91. The test was carried out under a normal load of 13 N to the rubber wheel of a diameter of 220 mm at a rotation speed of 50 rev.ymin. The abrasives used were 100 mesh Al2O3 grits fed at a rate of 70 gymin. The test was carried out for 15 min. Prior to the test the surface of the coating was polished. The average value from three test pieces was used to evaluate the abrasive wear of the coatings. During the spraying, the low power plasma torch was manipulated by the robot (Motoman , Yasnac) to keep traversing speed of plasma torch over the substrate and spray distance from plasma torch to the substrate at the given parameters. The moving speed of plasma torch was set at 200 mmys during spraying. The cooling air jet towards the substrate moved simultaneously with the plasma torch and the substrate temperature was monitored to be less than 150 8C, during spraying, using a handheld non-contact infrared temperature measurement test (Rayrpm30l3u, Raytek). The coating was deposited to a thickness from approximately 200 to 250 mm. 3. Experimental results 3.1. Effect of spray parameters on particle velocity For a given powder, particle conditions are the most important parameters, which influence performances of a spray coating. Particle velocity and temperature are regarded as two basic parameters of the spray particle. The influence of spray parameters on the microstructure and properties of deposited coating will be realized through the change of particle conditions. Fig. 2 shows the influence of spray distance measured from the nozzle exit on particle velocity under plasma power of 2.8 kW and gas flow of 35 lymin. It can be recognized that Al2O3 particles achieved velocity of approximately 200300 mys. There is no significant change of particle velocity with the increase in spray distance up to 40 mm. However, a rapid decrease from 270 to 200 mys with the further increase in spray

Fig. 2. Effect of spray distance on particle velocity.

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Fig. 3. Effect of plasma power on particle velocity.

Fig. 4. Effect of gas flow on particle velocity.

distance up to 60 mm was recognized. This means that the acceleration by free plasma jet is limited. For the axial powder injection through the hollow cathode in the present study, spray particle acceleration mainly takes place in the torch nozzle owing to low power and less intensive plasma jet. This is completely different from the conventional plasma spraying, in particular, with an external powder feed port. Therefore, the plasma conditions determined by the generation parameters influences significantly the plasma fluid velocity and acceleration of spray particle. Furthermore, as for the low inertial Al2O3 powder of size from 10 to 20 mm, the deceleration of particle in the free plasma jet of low velocity becomes significant. Fig. 3 shows the influence of plasma power on the particle velocity under the gas flow of 35 lymin and spray distance of 20 mm. It can be seen that the particle velocity was not influenced significantly with an increase in plasma power for the present torch. This may be due to much less intensively electromagnetic pinching effect on plasma jet resulting from low plasma power, which is only approximately 1y10 of the plasma used conventionally for spraying.

Fig. 5. Typical microstructure of Al2O3 coatings deposited under different plasma powers: (a) 2.2 kW; (b) 3.0 kW; and (c) 3.9 kW.

Fig. 4 shows the effect of gas flow on particle velocity under the plasma power of 2.8 kW and spray distance of 20 mm. It is clear that the particle velocity increased significantly with an increase in plasma gas flow. Generally, velocity of plasma jet depends on the structure of plasma torch and processing parameters such as plasma power and gas flow and so on. With the increase in gas flow, the velocity of plasma jet increases accordingly, which results from an improved thermal pinching effect on plasma jet. Consequently, such an effect leads to an increase in particle velocity. Furthermore, for the plasma torch with an axial powder injection through hollow cathode used in the present study the flying trajectory of spray particle is parallel to the direction of the plasma jet. Acceleration of spray particle is mainly realized in torch nozzle. As a result, the influence of gas flow on particle velocity is more significant than that for conventional plasma spray torch.

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Fig. 6. XRD patterns of Al2O3 coatings deposited under different plasma powers: (a) 2.2 kW; and (b) 3.9 kW.

3.2. Effect of plasma power on the microstructure and abrasive wear loss of Al2O3 coating Fig. 5 shows the typical microstructure of Al2O3 coatings sprayed at gas flow of 35 lymin and spray distance of 10 mm under different plasma powers of 2.2, 3.0 and 3.9 kW. Although the coating deposited at high power presented a relatively apparent dense microstructure, no significant effect of plasma power on the microstructure of the deposited coating was recognized. XRD analysis of the Al2O3 coatings deposited under different plasma powers, as shown by XRD patterns in Fig. 6 for powers of 2.2 and 3.9 kW, revealed that Al2O3 coatings mainly consisted of g-Al2O3. This fact suggests that the deposited spray particles have reached sufficiently melting state prior to impact on the substrate. Moreover, the relative intensity of a-Al2O3 with respect to g-Al2O3 suggested that melting of spray particle would be improved at a high plasma power. Fig. 7 shows the effect of plasma power on the abrasive wear loss of the Al2O3 coating deposited by low power plasma spray. It can be seen that the abrasive wear loss decreased significantly with the increase in plasma power from 2.2 to 3.0 kW. With a further increase in plasma power, no significant change in the abrasive wear was recognized. According to the measurement results of particle velocity and XRD analysis, it can be

Fig. 8. Typical microstructure of Al2O3 coatings deposited at different spray distances: (a) 30 mm; and (b) 45 mm.

suggested that the abrasive wear of deposited Al2O3 coating mainly depends on the particle melting condition. 3.3. Effect of spray distance on the microstructure and abrasive wear loss of Al2O3 coating Fig. 8 shows the typical microstructure of Al2O3 coating sprayed under the plasma power of 3.9 kW and gas flow of 35 lymin at different spray distances of 30 and 45 mm. The examination of those microstructures together with that of the coating shown in Fig. 5c revealed that the apparent porosity in the coating increased with the increase in spray distance. However, XRD pattern of the Al2O3 coating deposited at spray distance of 45 mm, as shown in Fig. 9, revealed that coating mainly consisted of g-Al2O3 which suggested

Fig. 7. Effect of plasma power on the abrasive wear loss of Al2O3 coating.

Fig. 9. XRD pattern of Al2O3 coating deposited at spray distance of 45 mm.

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Fig. 10. Effect of spray distance on the abrasive wear loss of Al2O3 coating.

Fig. 12. Effect of plasma gas flow on the abrasive wear loss of Al2O3 coating.

that Al2O3 particle has reached sufficiently melting state during spraying. The test of abrasive wear loss of the coating showed that the wear loss of the coating increased significantly with an increase in spray distance as shown in Fig. 10. Compared with the observed particle velocity, it can be found that the particle velocity changes little at the spray distance up to 45 mm as it is used to deposit coatings for abrasive test. Taking into account the change of wear loss about a factor of 4, it is evident that the particle velocity has a much limited effect on the abrasive wear performance of plasma sprayed Al2O3 coating. 3.4. Effect of plasma gas flow on the microstructure and abrasive wear loss of Al2O3 coating Typical microstructure of Al2O3 coating sprayed at plasma power of 3.3 kW and spray distance of 10 mm under different plasma gas flows of 35 and 42 lymin are illustrated in Fig. 11. Compared with the coating deposited under gas flow of 35 lymin, it can be recognized that the coating deposited at a gas flow of 42 lymin presented apparently more porous microstructure. The effects of plasma gas flow on the abrasive wear loss of Al2O3 coating is illustrated in Fig. 12. The

abrasive wear loss of the coating was decreased with the increase in gas flow up to 35 lymin. This attributed an increase in particle velocity because a high velocity leads to high impact pressure w32x and consequently a dense coating. Moreover, the further increase in gas flow to 42 lymin leads to an increase in the wear loss. This fact indicates that the improvement in abrasive wear performance of ceramic coating cannot be always achieved by increasing the particle velocity during plasma spraying. On the contrary, an extensive increase in particle velocity leads to significant shortening of heating time of spray particle by plasma, which results in the formation of the coating with degraded performance. 4. Discussion Through the examination of microstructure and abrasive wear loss of low power plasma-sprayed Al2O3 coatings, it was recognized that processing parameters have significant influence on the microstructure and properties of the coatings. With an increase in plasma power, the temperature and enthalpy of plasma jet increased accordingly. However, according to the observed particle velocity the dwelling time of spray particle in plasma jet was not

Fig. 11. Typical microstructure of Al2O3 coatings deposited under different gas flows: (a) 35 lymin; and (b) 42 lymin.

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Table 2 Spray parameters for conventional high power plasma spraying Plasma gas Ar flow (lymin) H2 flow (lymin) Current (A) Voltage (V) Spray distance (mm) AryH2 68 15.8 700 55 100

decreased with plasma power increased from 2.2 to 2.8 kW. Therefore, an increase in plasma power will benefit particle temperature and subsequently the cohesion of flattened particles in the coating, which is well consistent with the result of abrasive wear loss test. With the further increase in plasma power, increasing particle velocity result in a slightly decrease of dwelling time of particle in plasma jet. The fact without significant change in abrasive wear loss can be attributed that the improvement of heating effect to particle can compensate the shortening of dwelling time of particles in plasma jet. Therefore, the present result on the effect of plasma power evidently suggests that particle melting state is more important in determining coating abrasive wear performance. Such result is also evident from the examination of effect of gas flow rate on particle velocity and coating wear performance. The observed particle velocity increased with the increase in gas flow significantly. High particle velocity tends to result in the deposition of a dense coating. Therefore, it can be expected that the abrasive wear loss of Al2O3 coating is decreased with the gas flow, as observed for the gas flow up to 35 lymin. However, the further increases in gas flow lead to a significant decrease in wear performance. This is due to an excessive shortening of the dwelling time of particle in plasma jet. The examination into the relation between particle velocity and abrasive wear loss from the change of spray distance (Figs. 2 and 10) also clearly revealed that the effect of particle velocity on the determination of the coating abrasive wear performance is limited. However, it is evident that heating the particle and subsequently the temperature of the spray particle will be a more important parameter to influence the coating performance. The previous result revealed that the lamellar cohesion, which influences significantly the abrasive wear performance such as wear performance, is increased little with the increase in plasma power when the power reaches to a certain level for a given system w14,15x. This is because increasing plasma heating ability and shortening dwelling time occurs simultaneously with the increase in plasma power. To compare with the coating deposited by conventional plasma spray process, a high power plasma spray system (GP-80, 80 kW class, Jiujiang) was used to deposit Al2O3 coating under the typical process parameters at a plasma power of 38.5

kW as shown in Table 2. The microstructure of sprayed coating is illustrated in Fig. 13. It can be recognized that the microstructure of low power plasma-sprayed Al2O3 coating is comparable to that of conventional high power plasma-sprayed coating. The coating deposited at the power of 38.5 kW yielded an abrasive wear loss of 24 mg, which is comparable to that of the coating sprayed by the low power plasma spray as seen in Fig. 7. The measurement of the particle velocity in low power plasma spray showed that spray particle reached a velocity comparable to those of Al2O3 particles founded in conventional plasma spraying at the distance depositing coating w19,33x. Compared to the abrasive wear losses of the deposited Al2O3 coatings and particle velocities in both low power spraying operating at a power level approximately 4 kW and conventional plasma spraying operating at a power level of 40 kW, it can be recognized that the comparable particle conditions and subsequent coating of the comparable microstructure and properties can be achieved despite the difference of plasma power in one order. It can be considered that such results provide the further experimental evidence to the fact that coating of the comparable performance can be produced despite plasma power level provided that spray particle reaches an identical condition. Compared with the conventional high power plasma spray torch, low power plasma spray torch developed in the present study has the advantages of low power, small jet dispersion and more comfortable work condition with low noise. The deposition spot on the substrate was less than 6 mm in diameter compared to the conventional plasma spraying of 1020 mm. Therefore, low power plasma spraying is suitable for spray narrow strips of small area with which the conventional torch will lead to much wastage of spray materials. Moreover, for thin wall parts high power plasma jet may result in the deformation of parts owing to the massive heat input to the parts, while with low power plasma spraying such problem may be avoided. For the low power plasma spraying system developed in the present experiment, the powder feed rate was controlled at 2 gymin and the

Fig. 13. Microstructure of Al2O3 coating deposited by conventional plasma jet operated at a power of 38.5 kW.

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deposition efficiency was approximately 4555%. It can be also expected that the low power plasma spraying will find practical applications in the electronic field such as manufacturing of miniature sensor etc. 5. Conclusions Using a low power spray torch with a novel hollow cathode, Al2O3 coating was successfully deposited under a low plasma power level of 2.23.9 kW using Al2O3 powder of particle size from 10 to 20 mm. XRD analysis of deposied coating revealed that coating primarily consisted of g-Al2O3 which indicated that the particles have reached sufficiently melting state prior to impact on the substrate. During low power plasma spraying with axial powder feed condition, the particle velocity was not influenced significantly by plasma arc power. The increase in plasma gas flow led to an increase in particle velocity, and increase in spray distance led to both decrease in particle velocity and temperature. The abrasive wear loss of Al2O3 coating was decreased with the increase in plasma power and decrease in spray distance. The particle velocity in low power plasma spray was comparable to that in conventional plasma spray at a power one order higher. It was clearly found that despite the difference of plasma power in one order the abrasive wear loss of the Al2O3 coating deposited by low power plasma spray was comparable to that of the coating deposited by conventional plasma spraying at power level of 39 kW. Therefore, the present result evidently suggested that the coating of a comparable property can be deposited by spray particles of the comparable conditions despite plasma power. References
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