Oxidation of In-flight Particles During HVAF—A Numerical Study

Oxygen present in the High Velocity Air-Fuel (HVAF) process can react with the in-flight metallic particles and cause their oxidation. A grown brittle oxide shell on metallic microsize particles can reduce their deposition efficiency and impair the coating final deposited properties/microstructure. In the current study, the oxide growth of MCrAlY particles, where M stands for Ni and Co, during their flight in the HVAF process has been modeled using the particle tracking scheme. A comprehensive theoretical oxide layer growth background is presented and used to track the particle oxidation process. The oxidation development includes the Mott-Cabrera theory for very thin films, which is function of the particle surrounding temperature and oxygen partial pressure. The very thin film regime, applicable under a limiting thickness, is defined based on the electric field present across the growing oxide layer. As the electric field decreases with oxide thickness, the oxidation rate is determined by thermal diffusion. The obtained results provide a correlation between HVAF system design and surface oxidation phenomena while offering a clear description of different oxidation stages.