Tue, 19 May, 2026
We are pleased to announce the publication of a new paper in the journal of Materials Science and Engineering A. The paper, ‘Cold spraying of mechanically alloyed compositionally complex Co18Cr24Fe14Ni33V11 alloy: Processability, microstructure, mechanical properties, and residual stress evaluation,’ was co-written by experts from TWI, the University of Leicester, the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, and AeonX AI.
Based upon work conducted as part of the EU Horizon 2020-funded FORGE project, the paper addresses the growing demand for materials capable of withstanding demanding environments and the potential of compositionally complex alloys (CCAs) to meet the requirements when deposited through cold spray (CS).
The paper details the first systematic evaluation of CS processability of a novel mechanically alloyed (MA) Co18Cr24Fe14Ni33V11 CCA powder, which was developed during the FORGE project and designed to achieve high hardness.
The CS process parameters, including gas temperature, pressure, and nozzle pre-chamber configuration, were systematically studied to achieve an optimal combination of deposition efficiency (DE), thickness per pass, and coating density onto various steel substrates (S700MC, H13, and AISI 310), with the results demonstrating that a gas temperature of 1100 °C and a pressure of 40 bar, combined with a short pre-chamber, minimised porosity (<0.3%), achieved DE above 30%, and produced coating thicknesses exceeding 40 μm per pass.
Correlation analyses identified temperature as the primary driver of coating quality, with pressure playing a secondary role. The microstructural analysis confirmed the effective transfer of powder microstructure to coating, which exhibited a median microhardness of 729 ± 63 HV0.1. This high hardness is attributed to the alloy composition, work hardening during mechanical alloying, and severe plastic deformation during deposition – placing it among the hardest CS CCA coatings reported in the open literature.
Adhesion strength inversely correlated with substrate hardness, peaking at > 64 ± 1 MPa on the softer AISI 310 substrates. Neutron diffraction measurements enabled evaluation of through-thickness residual stresses in the coating-substrate system, revealing a predominantly compressive stress state (−142 ± 27 MPa) within the coating. Interpretation using the analytical model for progressively deposited coatings indicates that the measured stresses arise from the combined effects of deposition-induced peening and thermal misfit between the coating and substrate.
The FORGE project sought to improve processes such as waste heat recovery, carbon capture, alternative process chemistries and high-energy processes, increasing output and efficiency while reducing greenhouse gas emissions for industries such as steel, aluminium, cement and ceramics, as well as contributing to the minimisation of overall capital and operative expenses.
You can see the published paper, in full, here: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.msea.2026.150378
FORGE is funded by the EU’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 958457.