This U.S.-Mexico award, jointly funded by the Divisiojn of Civil and Mechanical Engineering, the Division of Design, Manufacture, and Industrial Innovation, and the Division of International Programs, will provide support for a collaborative research project between Dr. Jacob J. Stiglich, Materials Modification, Inc. (MMI), and Dr. Ramiro Perez at the Institute of Physics of UNAM (IFUNAM), Cuernavaca, Mexico. The investigators intend to continue cooperative research on protective coatings applied to steel substrates.
Under the initial stages of the project, the researchers explored wear resistant coating performance utilizing two processes to coat steel substrates supplied by IFUNAM. Coatings were successfully applied and metallurgical bonds were established for all process conditions. Such bonds are essential for the successful industrial applications of any coating technology. This stage of the collaboration will investigate problems with deposited coatings due to the great thermal expansion mismatch between composites and steel. In particular, the investigators intend to address these problems by adding suitable stress relieving interlayers to the wear-resistant outer layer. Specimens manufactured by MMI, will be subject to high stress wear testing, corrosion testing and oxidation testing by IFUNAM. Technologies developed by this collaboration are capable of rapid transfer to industrial usage. By extending equipment life-cycles with the use of improved protective steel coatings, this project should be of industrial benefit to both countries.
