ALCOM

Aluminium Alloy Components Produced by Additive Manufacturing: Improvement of Performance by Multilayer Coatings

Additive manufacturing processes are bringing the most significant innovations in the development of lightweight metal components. Among lightweight metals, Al-Si alloys are widely used to achieve energy efficiency and structural lightness, with a significant increase in applications in electric vehicles. However, most components suffer surface damage during their useful life due to corrosion, wear, and/or fatigue. Therefore, to extend the use of additive manufactured Al-based components and fully leverage all their benefits in terms of vehicle weight reduction, it is necessary to overcome surface issues related to the 3D printing process, which can negatively impact service performance. ALCOM has developed surface modification solutions (Ni-P interlayer + DLC topcoat) to improve AlSi10Mg parts produced with Powder Bed Fusion-Laser Beam, in terms of corrosion and tribological behavior. Starting from the design and realization of a prototype addressing the main issues related to coating deposition, the entire surface modification cycle has been optimized to achieve the best combination of adhesion, corrosion, and erosion performance of the coating. The developed surface modification cycle has reduced the surface roughness (Rq) by 97%, delayed the incubation time for cavitation erosion by 75%, and increased the corrosion potential by 42% compared to the original version.