Method for applying a coating to a substrate

Abstract

A exemplary method of depositing a coating on a substrate using a spray process is provided that may include selecting a desired dominant feature (62) for the coating and controlling the spray process (64, 68) to have at least one of an in-flight particle temperature distribution and an in-flight particle velocity distribution predicted to produce the dominant feature. One aspect allows for adjusting (64, 68) the at least one distribution to cause the distribution to shift from an in-flight Gaussian particle distribution to an in-flight non-Gaussian particle distribution. It may be determined whether the dominant feature for the coating is deposited within acceptable limits (66) and adjusting the at least one in-flight particle distribution (68) if the dominant feature for the coating is not deposited within acceptable limits. One aspect allows for depositing on the substrate a spray jet of particles having a bimodal distribution of particle temperature and a bimodal distribution of particle velocity. These bimodal distributions may be tailored or adjusted (64, 68) to achieve a desired dominant feature of the coating. A plurality of particle distributions may be evaluated (60) to determine at least one respective dominant feature that is a characteristic of a coating applied using the respective evaluated particle distribution. At least one dominant feature to be a characteristic of the coating may be determined (62) and at least one of the evaluated particle distributions predicted to produce the at least one dominant feature may be selected (63) to form the non-Gaussian distribution.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.