Thermal Spray Trends That Are Set To Dominate 2017
In thermal spray coating processes, the coating is often applied on the surfaces of melted non-metallic or metallic materials. Thermal spray coatings normally form a thick, dense coating on the materials which are first smelted into a powder form, rod, or a wire. Presently, in the market, there are different forms of thermal coatings, for example, detonation, flame, HVOF coating, cold, arc, laser, and plasma spraying techniques.
Factors Driving Thermal Spray Trends
The thermal spray market is mostly motivated by the demand from the manufacturers of turbines, which have increased due the evolution in the power generation sector, particularly in emerging and developing countries in Asia-Pacific region. The defense and the aerospace is also a driving force due to the increasing requirement of turbines. Besides the growing demands in the turbines market, thermal spray coatings are utilised for a myriad of other processes, like HVOF coating is being used instead of hard chrome coating for docking gear operations in the aerospace industry.
Industrial research has identified some emerging trends which are behind the increasing demand for thermal spray coatings in the global market:
- Increasing requirement of ceramic coating
- Growth in demand for plasma spraying
- New requirements in emerging and developing markets
Ceramic coatings
Today, thermal sprayings for ceramic coatings is universally adopted by various processes in the global industries. The coefficient for heat transfer for ceramic coatings being very low creates an excellent barrier for thermal heat. Due to this advantage, the aerospace, food processing, and automotive industries are increasingly going in for this ceramic coating technique. As ceramic coatings aids in heat protection, it can be used for coating components of the engine exhaust systems like exhaust headers, turbochargers, cat boxes, tail pipes, and exhaust manifolds.
Plasma Spraying
The thermal spray industry is beholding an increase in the use of plasma spray coatings around the world. The basic benefit of plasma spray coating is that they can be used for a multitude of materials consisting of ceramics and metals. A critical treatment of plasma spray coats is on jet engines and provides protection to all the various components from the high temperatures of the combustion gases to which they are subjected. More organizations are opting for plasma spray coatings because they are cleaner, denser, and stronger.
Emerging and Developing Markets
There is also a rise in requirements for thermal spraying from the emerging and developing economies like China, Brazil, India and many others. The precipitous economic growth of these emerging markets, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region, contributes significantly to the expenditure on products like furniture, appliances, and automobiles. As a result of this increasing demand, several manufacturing industries have fortified their supply chain by setting up factories in China, Brazil, and India.
At A&A Coatings, we provide a wide array of thermal spray coating solutions that are used in many industries. Contact us today to find out which solution best suit your needs.
