Royce Wise wrote:

Anyone know anything about plasma spraying of chromium carbide on
aluminum?
Royce

Here is a better link with a picture of the process.

http://www.inel.gov/featurestories/08-01r-d-branagan.shtml

It is not so much the hardness of the coating as it is how well
it adheres to the base metal. The failure mode is in the base metal.

That is why detonation gun coating works better than flame spray
coating. The impact of the supersonic coating particles embed themselves
in the base metal to form a mechanical lock. I notice they did not
mention det gun coating with this material.

Note that super hard steel "approaches" the hardness of tungsten carbide.
The material of choice in det coatings. Note also that silicon nitride is also
mentioned. That is the material used to make the ceramic apex seals
and turbo/NC machine ball bearings.

It would be interesting to send him email at  
                      
                      Daniel Branagan
                      208-526-4674
                      brandj@inel.gov

And see what he says about aluminum end housings.
He could coat an aluminum plate and bolt it in a junk
Mazda engine as the center or intermediate housing and 
rotate the engine with a large electric motor. 
With and without lube.
The center housing is super simple with no phasing gear 
accommodations.


Paul Lamar
 
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