On deposition of Waspaloy coatings by cold spray

The deposition of pore free and highly adhered Ni and Co superalloy coatings is of great interest for engine design and gas turbine applications, both in case of maintenance repair and overhaul operations as well for mechanical and chemical protection purposes in aeronautics and energy applications. This study would like to give a wide overview about the capability of cold spray technology on this topic: two different commercially available deposition systems, Sulzer-CGT Kinetiks 4000 and Plasma Giken PCS-1000, were compared, and deposition processes with both nitrogen and helium as carrier gas have been explored. Microstructural investigation, microhardness and adhesion results are reported to depict a preliminary scenario of coating properties. Fully dense coatings with thickness > 1 mm and adhesion > 50 MPa are obtained using helium, while quite porous, 20 MPa adhered coatings are obtained using nitrogen. Finally, general considerations about the potential applicability of those coatings for repair purpose in aerospace applications are pointed out.