The Utilization of Plasma-Deposited Coatings on Aluminum

Plasma deposited ceramic, cermet and metallic coatings on aluminum substrates offer all the weight saving and other advantages of aluminum components with the additional benefits of surfaces tailored to meet the unique wear, frictional, thermal, and/or other requirements in a particular application. The successful utilization of such coatings, however, requires, in addition to a knowledge of the coatings desired characteristics, an understanding of the mechanical properties of the coatings and their interaction with the substrate. These properties are dependent on the microstructure of the coatings and the conditions of deposition. A discussion of these points is followed by several examples of the use of coatings on aluminum alloys in the automotive industry.