Short description of my research work

There are number of components in automobile, aerospace and manufacturing industries where excellent surface properties are required to resist hostile environments of wear and corrosion. For such application, we need components with high hardness, high wear resistance and high corrosion/oxidation resistant alloys. For example: -

For the applications of these purposes, we are trying to develop the hard wear/corrosion resistant surfaces with help of laser assisted manufacturing (e.g., Laser cladding.)
Laser Cladding is newer technology for making high performance coating surfaces. This process utilizes a laser as heat source to deposit a thin layer of coating of desired metals/alloys/ceramics/MMCs on moving substrate. Minimal dilution Minimum distortion and Better surface quality makes this process more attractive over the conventional coating techniques such as Arc Welding Plasma Spraying etc.

Fig: Laser Cladding working principles (a) Pre-placed, and (b) Co-deposition techniques (Ref. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.optlastec.2020.106619)

My research work mainly focuses on the development of hard face coatings of Co-Cr-W-C alloys on different steel substrates using laser. Microstructural and mechanical characterization will be performed to understand the mechanism behind process so that coating properties can be improved further by optimizing process parameters. To understand the solidification behaviour and to predict microstructure, based on heat transfer in single layer clad, a numerical model will be developed.