Identifying defects and problems in laser cladding and suggestions of some remedies for the same

Abstract

The cladding method is a technology of bulk coating deposition. It finds wide applications for providing laser coating of resistance to abrasion, erosion, corrosion, sliding wear, and heat barrier for improved performance and prolonging service life of the end products. Coating development by laser cladding is quite challenging due to the involvement of a large number of process controlling parameters. About thirty sets of process parameters involve in material deposition and quality control of the laser coatings. Ample research and investigations were already carried out and are still going on for the improvement of surface properties of several engineering components using laser cladding method. As per review, identifying the causes of defects-andproblems in laser cladding and suggesting their remedies are rarely found to be presented in the open literature. In this present investigations, firstly, measures to mitigate the defects and problems in laser cladding are presented with a comprehensive review aiming to be useful for applying cladding in the coating industries. Secondly, troubleshooting in laser cladding was undertaken for the ease of material deposition as well as improvement of coating quality. Problems like material deposition, surface cracks and porosity were identified and reduced experimentally and presented. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Selection and/or Peer-review under responsibility of International Conference on Materials Manufacturing and Modelling (ICMMM - 2017).