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© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

The automotive industry is a pioneer in solutions that meet market expectations. However, in the automotive industry, some less environmentally friendly technologies are still used, such as electroplating. Due to legislative restrictions in several countries, thin coatings made in a vacuum have been replacing coatings traditionally made by electroplating, mainly in decorative terms. This work is more focused on the use of these coatings made in vacuum for optical applications, namely on headlights and exterior backlit components. Although these components are protected during the period of use, there may be situations of contact during the assembly of the components or their repair, necessary to safeguard and to ensure that these coatings have the scratch and wear resistance needed to withstand any treatment deficiency during the operations referred to above. Therefore, this work is essentially focused on the study of the wear resistance of Cr coatings made by PVD (Physical Vapour Deposition) on polymeric substrates. To this end, the coatings previously studied have now been subjected to micro-abrasion tests, with a view to assessing their wear resistance. For this purpose, alumina abrasive has been used, and the wear mechanisms observed in the coatings were studied. The abrasion and scratch tests showed that the most stable film has the one provided with 10-layers, showing greater wear resistance as well, greater adhesion to the substrate and less cohesive failures in the performed tests. Given the nature of the substrate and the coating, the results obtained are very promising, showing that these 10-layer Cr thin coatings can overcome any careless operation during manufacturing, assembly and repair processes, when applied in lightning or backlit components in motor vehicles.

Details

Title
Wear Characterization of Chromium PVD Coatings on Polymeric Substrate for Automotive Optical Components
Author
Baptista, Andresa 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Pinto, Gustavo 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Silva, Francisco J G 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Ferreira, Andreia A 2 ; Pinto, Arnaldo G 2 ; Sousa, Vitor F C 2 

 Department of Mechanical Engineering, ISEP—School of Engineering, Polytechnic of Porto, Rua Dr. António Bernardino de Almeida, 431, 4200-072 Porto, Portugal; [email protected] (A.B.); [email protected] (G.P.); [email protected] (A.A.F.); [email protected] (A.G.P.); [email protected] (V.F.C.S.); INEGI—Instituto de Ciência e Inovação em Engenharia Mecânica e Engenharia Industrial, Rua Dr. Roberto Frias, 4100, 4200-465 Porto, Portugal 
 Department of Mechanical Engineering, ISEP—School of Engineering, Polytechnic of Porto, Rua Dr. António Bernardino de Almeida, 431, 4200-072 Porto, Portugal; [email protected] (A.B.); [email protected] (G.P.); [email protected] (A.A.F.); [email protected] (A.G.P.); [email protected] (V.F.C.S.) 
First page
555
Publication year
2021
Publication date
2021
Publisher
MDPI AG
e-ISSN
20796412
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
2532312165
Copyright
© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.