Oxidation resistance of Mo/Cr bilayer coating on Zr alloy in a 1200 °C steam environment

The Cr-coated Zr alloys demonstrate excellent resistance to high-temperature steam oxidation. However, the rapid diffusion pathways for oxygen formed by the inter-diffusion between the coating and alloy at high temperatures significantly affect the steam oxidation resistance of the coated alloys. To address this issue, we developed a Mo/Cr bilayer coating on Zr alloy by a combination of dc-MS and HiPIMS surface treatments. The coating exhibits outstanding steam oxidation resistance at high temperatures, resulting in a mass gain approximately 86.6% and 44.1% lower than that of the bare Zr alloy and Cr coating, respectively, after 30 min of steam oxidation at 1200 °C. This is mainly because, during the oxidation process, the Mo interface layer undergoes a transformation into a thin and high-quality double diffusion layer structure, effectively avoiding high-temperature inter-diffusion between the Cr coating and Zr alloy, thereby inhibiting the formation of oxygen diffusion pathways.