Erosion Resistant Coatings & Physical Vapour Deposition Reactive Ion Coating (RIC® EB-PVD)

The Reactive Ion Coating (RIC®) process is plasma assisted electron beam evaporation Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD) process used to deposit hard, erosion resistant Titanium Nitride coatings for gas turbine compressors operating in harsh environments. Volcanic ash, calcium carbonate, silica and alumina sand particulate are all current problems with engine performance.

Rapid deterioration of blades and vanes affects engine performance and erosion resistant coatings are required to extend engine service time by as much as 3 times.

EB-PVD coatings do not require mechanical roughening of the surface to apply the materials like Arc PVD coatings do. This results in lower fatigue life issues and improves overall surface finish without post polishing processes.

Liburdi's latest evolution of the coatings is the GENIII EB-PVD erosion coating. GENIII is "REEM" polish friendly and improves super surface finishes to less than 6 µinches RMS. GENIII improves the erosion resistance and corrosion resistance of the materials by a quantum leap to over 10- 15 times the original erosion coatings requirements.

Other benefits include:

Most compressor alloys can be coated, including AM355, A286, IN718, Custom 450, Ti-6Al-4V, some T6 aluminum alloys and others.

Increased compressor performance:

  • through retention of chord width and leading edge geometry
  • through blade height and chamber thickness
  • through stator vane shape and retention of geometry
  • through fouling resistance and reduced engine wash frequencies
  • lower EGT margins
  • Improve SFC by 0.3- 1% when used with Liburdi's LSP super polishing process
  • completely removable at overhaul and benign to the parent materials &mdash Liburdi's proprietary stripping solutions do not affect the blade geometry or inherent mechanical properties.

Liburdi has provided this RIC® technology for over two decades for commercial and military applications worldwide.

Commerically available engine programs

  • JT8D
  • PW2000
  • T64
  • CT58
  • T56

Download RIC Datasheet: click here

Download RIC GenIII Datasheet: click here

protective Coatings M107

EB-PVD coating of HPC blades