Reflection and thermal characteristics of a novel reflective phase-change coating irradiated by high-power continuous laser

Abstract

In order to improve the smart control performance of laser protective materials under the high-power laser irradiation, a novel smart phase-change laser protective coating is proposed and prepared by using phenolic resin and zirconia, combined with the slow-gradient heating and drying technique and spraying process. The influences of laser ablation on the macrostructure of coating shows that the prepared coating can withstand the laser irradiation up to 3102 W/cm2 for 7 s at the wavelength of 1064 nm. The effect of high-intensity laser irradiation on structure evolution has been further investigated. It is found that increasing the laser power density will change the coating microscopic structure from the initial lumpy structure to a flocculent crystal structure, and finally form a flake structure, which is considered as the main reason for the increase of reflectivity. The experimental results show that the reflectivity on the coating surface can be increased by 75.7% before and after laser irradiation. Finally, the phase transition temperature of the coating is investigated, and the thermal insulation performances between coating and substrate have also been compared. The temperature insulation performance of the novel phase-change coating is found to be 1.2–15 times higher than that of the substrate.