Wear and Corrosion Protection Coatings of Brake Discs Using EHLA

Current global political debates on climate protection demand for a reduction of fine dust emissions. The generation of fine dust by exhaust gases from road traffic has already been reduced significantly in recent decades. Nevertheless, there is still fine dust pollution mainly caused through brake wear1. Economical and resource-conserving coating technologies for wear and corrosion protection of brake discs promise to be an essential solution with regard to this challenge.

One of them is the Extreme High-Speed Laser Material Deposition (EHLA) process. Unlike conventional Laser Material Deposition (LMD), the energy is introduced into the powder filler material above the substrate during EHLA. The process achieves a high process speed (up to 500 m/min), a layer thickness from 20 to 350 μm, metallurgical bonded layers free from defects and a high material efficiency (up to 95 %). Furthermore, almost any alloy can be applied for coatings of the substrate material (e.g. iron-, nickel-, aluminum-based alloys, Metal Matrix Composites (MMC) through the use of EHLA. Additionally, process efficiency in terms of energy and resources is increased and coating time is reduced.