Refurbishment of torpedo ladle and locomotion axles through Laser Applied Surface Engineering (Re-LASE)

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The highly demanding in-service conditions of torpedo ladle axles in steel production and high speed locomotion axles result in high levels of abrasive wear and fatigue on short timescales, thus contributing to high scrappage rates. Applying a suitable Laser Engineered Coating (LEC) on to worn ladle and locomotive axles will generate large savings on replacement costs, as well as eliminating the CO2 burden of manufacturing new components. LEC technology is a recent development, successfully implemented in a variety of applications where resistance to wear is the foremost consideration and fatigue performance is not seen as important. The lack of development of metallurgical powders which lead to enhanced fatigue performance has limited the growth of LEC into much broader applications, such as the aforementioned axles, where behaviour under cyclic stress is a key concern for safety reasons. Therefore in this project a comprehensive programme of powder and LEC development will be performed to produce new coatings optimised for combined high fatigue, wear and adhesion performance, which will be validated through both destructive and non-destructive evaluation.