Organic-ceramic hybrid lubricating coating from thermal-sprayed ceramic templates

Solid-liquid composite lubrication coatings provide highly reliable and long-lasting solutions to friction, wear, and lubrication problems in extremely harsh environments. Herein, a novel type of solid-liquid composite lubrication coating with a high load-bearing capacity and long service life was constructed by introducing epoxy resin containing lubricating oil into inherent defects of thermally sprayed ceramic coatings. Compared with conventional ceramic coatings, the hybrid coatings exhibited an 80.5 % reduction in the coefficient of friction to 0.15 and a decrease in the specific wear rate from 2.69 × 10−4 mm3·N−1·m−1 to 3.86 × 10−8 mm3·N−1·m−1. The low friction and wear of the composite coating were mainly attributed to the formation of a well-covered lubrication film consisting of PFPE, epoxy resin, Al2O3, and ZrO2 during the friction of the composite coating. This paper presented a novel approach to preparing new solid-liquid composite lubricating coatings that using unavoidable defects in thermal sprayed ceramic coatings to introduce a lubricating phase.