Adherence of Al2O3 to CoCrAl coatings

Adhesion between surface scale and protective coating is an essential requirement of a material possessing good overall oxidation resistance. Poor adhesion can lead to exfoliation of the oxide in response to thermal cycling, or mechanically applied stresses, resulting in enhanced oxidation rates. Marked improvements in scale/substrate adhesion can be obtained via the formation of protrusions of oxide growing into the substrate. These act to key the protective scale to the surface and are more effective when a uniform distribution of small oxide pegs can be achieved. Thus, the structure of the coating, the type of rare earth addition, and its concentration are all important and this has been examined using EB-PVD CoCrAl coatings containing a variety of elemental additions. These have been subjected to both isothermal and cyclic oxidation in the temperature range 1000 to 12000C. The coating/scale interface and the development of pegs growing into the coating has been examined in detail by dissolving away the underlying metal + coating using a Br-methanol