Improvement of flame spraying PEEK coating characteristics using lasers

Flame spraying is frequently used for PEEK coatings elaboration on metallic surfaces. However, this process has a certain number of limitations particularly considering the quality of the coatings like high porosity or low interfacial adherence. For that reason a thermal post-processing is often necessary. From all of the processes which can be used (flame, oven. etc.). laser can be an interesting technology. Then, the aim of this study is to analyse the dependence of the morphological structure (compactness) and the adherence of the flame sprayed PEEK coatings to the stainless steel (304L) and aluminium alloy (AA2017) substrates on laser parameters. Moreover, the influence of the laser beam wavelength (by using a Nd:YAG, CO2 or diode lasers) on compactness of the coating was analysed. Whatever the laser used, it consists to estimate the most optimized parameters to achieve melting without burning the PEEK material. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.