Sunday, March 11, 2018

An Overview Of Tungsten Carbide Coatings

By Richard Patterson


Tungsten carbide is a chemical compound consisting of various metallic and non-metallic elements which pose cohesive and adhesive properties in their chemical structures. They exhibit the above characteristics when treated under controlled chemical conditions. Therefore, the compound is applied as a coating powder due to their distinct binding properties to form an anti-wear coating to galling, abrasion and fretting. The tungsten carbide coatings are primarily done by thermal sprays to achieve a strong concrete coating.

Several techniques which include: thermal and plasma sprays are employed to get the opted coating texture which primarily depends on the application procedures used. A further coating operation is usually used which is aimed for secondary and tertiary fusibility purposes to produce a stronger metallic luster. It thus portrays appealing results and facilitates consistency in application.

The critical process ordains by combusting fuel gas and mixing it with oxygen gas which is then subjected to high pressure to generate a high velocity through increasing the kinetic energy. The mixture of gases is then strictly injected through a narrowed nozzle. At the nozzle point, it is mixed with the tungsten carbide feedstock powder where it jets out at an accelerating velocity.

Then the mixture in a high velocity is injected on the substrate surface to be applied thus losing the gained kinetic energy due to an instant halt. Therefore, the particles adopt the kinetic energy by clinging together on the metal surface resulting in a dense uniform coating with low porosity characteristics. Similarly, a high bond coating is attained due to the cohesive and adhesive properties of the powder.

In instances where the specific coating is needed, a binder material is chemically mixed with the carbide compound. This yields a harder component with relatively a higher melting point due to its brittleness. The resulting coating manifests hardness and higher resistance to frictional wear. This is centrally determined by the grain size and the volume of the binder material used.

The binder material and chemical technique selected determines the resulting coating characteristics and its ability to curb irritating processes like corrosion, erosion, and abrasion in drastic wear conditions. Through the above technique, it renders it applicable in various industries processes like in paper production where the desired paper output is solely determined by the nature of the rolling surface.

The coating technology is also applicable to power generation points, majorly coal-oriented power plants. It plays a key role in maintaining the surfaces from adverse conditions like corrosion. Similarly, the coating is also widely used in steel and metal production from the fabrication process to the finishing process. Collectively, it serves as cost reduction technique, and thus it efficiently fosters productivity.

The introduction of these coatings has accrued tantamount benefits in the engineering community. It has led to operational and maintenance cost reduction in the cases of entirely solid plants that involved combustion chambers in their production. Therefore, it has led to obsolesce of other coating methods like hard chromium coatings which are characterized by undesirable attributes.




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