ABSTRACT
Nowadays, local surface treatment of materials with concentrated energy fluxes induced by laser and electron beams or plasma jets becomes more and more common in practice. The use of such technologies allows local hardening, thermo-chemical treatment, surface fusion and alloying. All these methods, excluding plasma ones, cost much and known plasma technique does not provide a sufficient level of energy concentration as ensured by laser or electron beams. At the Heat and Mass Transfer Institute, vortex stabilization of an electric arc to localize a spot on the material surface, for increase and control energy flux density, and provide continuous spot movement has been studied. The technique implies blocking of a convective heat flux from an arc plasma beyond the treated zone using an appropriately organized vortex flow. As a results, an article is only affected by an arc spot plasma. Flow control allows one to change heat flux density in the treated region by more than an order of magnitude.
