Laser Surface Texturing of Ceramic Coatings to Improve Adhesion; The Takeoff of Aviation: a Social Shaping Analysis of Jet Aircraft 2 views

Today, mass travel by jet aircraft is a pivotal part of society, but it wasn’t always that way. The advent of jet aircraft required many major leaps forward in technology and was accompanied by major changes to society. These changes shaped each other. This process has not stopped since new refinements of jet engine technology are still pursued by industry. This thesis contains two major discussions, an STS discussion of an application of social shaping theory to the development and effects of jet engine technology, and a technical discussion of our capstone project which focused on improving a specific part of jet engines to practically allow for more efficient operation. Note that the prospectus document which is included in the portfolio is not on the same topic as the STS thesis due to a midyear topic change. Focusing on these two topics in tandem is key to a good engineers perspective, since a good engineers consider the impacts of their work, in addition to the technical side. In my STS thesis, through the use of examples throughout the 20th century, I conclude that jet engines have certainly been shaped by society, and that jet engine technology has certainly shaped our society. In the technical thesis, we explore the effectiveness of a process (texturing) to improve coating adhesion which will enable the transition to CMC turbine blades, which will enable higher temperature and therefore more efficient jet engine operation. Through direct adhesion experimentation on different texturing procedures, we conclude that texturing has a positive effect on coating adhesion (which will enable the technology transition), though more rigorous experimentation is needed to determine the magnitude of the effects.

BS (Bachelor of Science)

Ytterbium Disilicate Coatings; Jet era; Mass travel; Social Shaping Theory; Jet Engine Efficiency

School of Engineering and Applied Science Bachelor of Science in Materials Science and Engineering Technical Advisor: James Fitz-Gerald STS Advisor: S. Travis Elliot Technical Team Members: Finley Pettitt, Andrea Watson, Aaron Sweeney, Isabel Mittal, Michael Hann

English

2026-05-07