Industrial Engineering Journal

ISSN: 0970-2555
Volume : 53, Issue 4, No. 6, April : 2024
[

THERMAL SPRAY COATING MATERIAL AGAINST EROSION IN BOILER PLANTS

Mrs. A. Sreelatha, Assistant Professor, Dept. Of Computer Science, University Arts and Science
College, Kakatiya University.
Dr P. Praveen, Associate Professor, Dept. Of CS&AI, SR University.

Abstract
Slurry erosion of turbine components in hydro power plants is a serious problem faced
all over the world. Researchers are continuously working on investigating the ways to
mitigate the effect of slurry erosion. Different techniques are employed to protect the
material from deteoriation of its life, techniques such as filtration of the sand particles
were carried out to reduce the amount of sand particles in the water which is impacting
on the turbine components and designing the shape of turbine components in such a
manner so as to mitigate the effect of slurry erosion. Still slurry erosion is most
prioritize area among the researchers as it is causing heavy economic losses. As a new
alternative, researchers are exploring the thermal spray coating technique as an option
by which the surface properties of the material will be improved.
Thermal spraying is one of the most prominent methods used now a days to prevent
the material from abrasive wear, high temperature corrosion, erosive wear and
stresses, as it increases the life span of material used in service. High velocity Oxy
Fuel (HVOF) spraying is among the thermal spraying techniques which are known for
its various characteristics such as providing hardness, wear resistant and dense micro
structured coatings. In this paper an attempt has been made to present a state of art
review of the work done by various researchers to prevent slurry erosion of hydraulic
machine components by using HVOF Spray technique.
The selective catalytic reduction (SCR) catalyst of a 660 MW ultra-supercritical once-
through boiler denitrification system suffered severe abrasion, causing the
denitrification system to fail. Statistics showed the abrasion area focused on near side
of the boiler. The formation mechanism of the catalyst abrasion is analyzed using
general purpose computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The simulation results are
consistent with the actual test data. It reveals that the catalyst abrasion is likely to be
caused by the no uniformity distribution of the fly ash particle field. The fly ash
distribution and the gas velocity in different cases were obtained. Under the best case,
the impact device can ensure fly ash particles in the upper part of catalyst move to the
far boiler side of catalyst. It is shown that the flow field and fly ash particle
distribution greatly improved after computation of the optimization.

Keywords: Erosion, Coating, HVOF, Thermal pray, Hardness, Stress

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 Industrial Engineering Journal
ISSN: 0970-2555
Volume : 53, Issue 4, No. 6, April : 2024
[

I. Introduction
The material used for high temperature applications are subjected to high temperature Erosion and
wear under erosion industrial environment. The coal gas environment contain many undesirable
species including Sulphur, sodium, vanadium etc. which combine to form corrosive salts. At this
high temperature, very erosion condition develops with the molten salt fluxing the protective oxide
scale or directly dissolving the metal. Also impact of fly ash and unburned carbon particles on the
surface of heated boiler tubes cause erosion called as fly ash erosion.High temperature oxidation and
erosion of heat exchanger tubes and other structural materials in coal-fired boilers are recognized as
being the main cause of downtime at power-generating plants, which could account for 50–75% of
their total arrest time. Maintenance costs for replacing broken tubes in the some installations are also
very high, and can be estimated at up to 54 % of the total production costs. The materials used in
these installations are fabricated from low-alloy carbon steels with chromium and molybdenum as
the primary alloy additions. Although chromium is expected to impart erosion resistance to high-
temperature alloys through the formation of a passive oxide layer on the alloy surface, its
concentration in boiler tube alloys in not sufficient to form a protective external scale. Present
materials being capable of resisting erosive environments are highly alloyed, and thus expensive. In
search for cost-effective solutions for Erosion – problems, various coatings like thermal sprayed
coatings have become attractive. seven graded steels under solid particle impacts at room
temperature and elevated temperature and found that oxidation is more influence the erosion
condition Coal-fired power plants are the traditional and major source of electric power generation in
India. There are four major divisions in coal-fired thermal power plant, which include turbine, boiler,
coal handling system and electrical energy handling system. Amongst these divisions, boiler is a
crucial and critical part of coal-fired power plant. The major components of the boiler are boiler
walls, economisers, air-heaters and super-heater tubes. The fly ash particles entrained in the fluidized
bed impact to the surface of boiler tubes and are deposited on the boiler tube components causing
erosion wear, oxidation and hot corrosion. In advanced stages of degradation of the components
material, the service-life of boilers and its parts get shorten. This requires shut down of the power
station unit to replace the damaged parts or components. Erosion wear of the engineering materials is
affected by operating conditions including impact angle, particle velocity and temperature; impacting
particles properties such as size, shape, density and hardness; and target material properties such as
hardness, roughness, strength and toughness, etc. Among these parameters, impact angle and
temperature play a vital role in erosion process. There is no universal model to predict the
effectiveness of these parameters. Experimental study of these parameters on erosion process is one
of the effective ways to analyse the erosion mechanism. Okonkwo et al studied the erosion behavior
of pipeline steel at particle speed ranging 20–80 m/s and impact angle at 30° and 90°. The authors
have found that ploughing mechanism is dominated at 90° impact angle while cutting at 30° impact
angle. Anton investigated the behavior of fat elevated temperature under the oblique angle of impact.
Patel studied the solid particle erosion behaviour of SS304 at room temperature and found that the
higher erosion occur at 30° as compared to 90° impact angle which indicated ductile mode of erosion
mechanism. Islam et al evaluated the erosion rate of AISI1018 and AISI 1080 steel with varying
particle velocity and impact angles and analysed that the erosion rate is increases with increasing
particle velocity and decreases with increasing impact angle. Nag raj studied the erosion behavior of
CY5SnBiM cast alloy at room temperature. The author found that impact angle is more dominant
parameter in comparison to impingement velocity while the erosion test is occurred. Wear scars are
found to be elliptical mostly at 30°, 60°, 90° and circular at 90°. Shimizu et al evaluated the erosion
characteristic of high Cr cast iron at 1173 K and found that at high temperature, more Cr content
having better erosion resistance. Zaragoza-Ganado et al studied the microstructural characters tic of
eroded surface of AISI 310 steel and found that mostly the sections are affected by plastic
deformation, ploughing, cracking and flacking.

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 Industrial Engineering Journal
ISSN: 0970-2555
Volume : 53, Issue 4, No. 6, April : 2024
[

EROSION
Erosion is the progressive loss of material from a solid surface as a result of mechanical interaction
between the solid surface and a multi-component fluid or impacting solid particles or liquid. Erosion
occurs when solid particles entrained in a fluid stream (gaseous or liquid) strike a surface
(Westergard et al. 2000). Manifestations of solid particle erosion in actual service conditions usually
in the form of thinning of components, a macroscopic scooping following the gas or particle flow,
surface roughening, lack of the directional grooving characteristic of abrasion and in some cases, the
formation of ripple patterns on metal surface (Davis 2001).
Solid particle erosion is an important material degradation mechanism encountered in a number of
engineering systems such as thermal power plants, aircraft gas turbine engines, pneumatic bulk
transport systems, coal liquefaction/gasification plants and ore or coal slurry pipe lines. The worst
case scenarios normally occur where there is a combination of both erosion and oxidation,
particularly in the cases of erosion and high-temperature oxidation (Wellman and Nicholls 2004,
Sundararajan and Roy 1997). In industrial applications and power generation, solid particles are
formed during the combustion of pulverized coal, heavy oils and synthetic fuels (Takeoff 1999a).
In order to mitigate the effect of the corrosion under Slurry erosion testing regime, catholic
protection was provided. It was also proved that any damage to the surface could be attributed to
pure erosion and as such, be assessed against the dry erosion test data. To identify the mechanism of
failure of the coatings, the researchers analyzed the SEM images of eroded surfaces and observed
that impinging slurry results in wear scars over the surfaces. Results obtained after testing revealed
variation in the level of degradation experienced by each type of coating under the respective test
conditions. It was found that Tungsten Carbide with a Cobalt binder gives the best result for both
cases of dry erosion and slurry erosion testing. Researchers also established the relation between
hardness and with thickness of the coating as shown in Fig. VI. It was observed that hardness of the
coating increased with thickness of coating up to some critical value and it started to decreasing with

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 Industrial Engineering Journal
ISSN: 0970-2555
Volume : 53, Issue 4, No. 6, April : 2024
[

increase in thickness of coating. The same has been shown in the Fig. there is general perception that
hardness of coating increases with increase in thickness.
PROTECTIVE COATINGS
Coatings provide a way of extending the limits of use of materials at the upper end of their
performance capabilities by allowing the mechanical properties of the substrate materials to be
maintained while protecting them against wear or hot corrosion (Silky and Hocking 1999). The role
of coating as a corrosion barrier is similar to the role of oxide layers. The coating is protective, if it
prevents outward diffusion of metal cations and inward diffusion of elements that could react with
the substrate material. Oxide layers forming on metals in reactions with atmosphere are self-healing
to a certain extent. If the oxide layer wears of or breaks up, a new oxide layer with almost equivalent
properties will form (Uusitalo et al. 2004).
Thermal spraying has emerged as an important tool of increasingly sophisticated, surface
engineering technology. Various properties of the coating, such as wear and hot corrosion resistance,
thermal or electrical insulation can be achieved using different coating techniques and coating
materials (Yamada et al. 2002). The term thermal spray describes a family of processes that use
chemical or electrical energy to melt (or soften) and accelerate particles of a material which is then
deposited on a surface (Pawlowski 1995). The quality of the coatings obtained by thermal spray
techniques is related to the nature of the process and the processing parameters. On the other hand,
thermal spray coatings are a good option to repair components and prevent excessive wear because
during the deposition process no significant changes to the microstructure of substrates or excessive
deformation are promoted (Santa et al. 2009).
In recent years, thermally sprayed coatings have also been increasingly applied to boiler tubes,
particularly in vulnerable areas, in an effort to reduce erosion rates and prolong tube life. Generally,
these coatings appear to be chosen on the basis of their good high temperature oxidation resistance
and are mainly alloys containing high quantities of nickel and/or chromium. Whilst it has been
reported that uniformly deposited and coherent metallic coatings can provide erosion protection, only
a few systematic experimentations have been undertaken to quantify the erosion performance of
these materials (Hoop and Allen 1999).

LITERATURE Survey

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