The objective of this thesis project was to compare the stress behaviour in thermal barrier coatings (TBCs) with FE analyses in both 2D and 3D. The main focus was to analyse the vertical stresses in the topcoat (TC) and how they varied in relation to different thicknesses of the thermally grown oxide (TGO), spraying methods of the bondcoat (BC) and the topography of the BC.

For the 2D simulations six samples were used; three with BCs sprayed with high-velocity oxy-fuel spraying and three sprayed with atmospheric plasma spraying. The samples had been exposed to isothermal heat treatment at 1150 °C for 0, 100 and 200 hours. Five images of each sample were taken with a scanning electron microscope, resulting in a total of 30 images. FE simulations based on these 30 images were done simulating a cooling from 1100 °C to 100 °C.

The 3D simulations were based on surfaces created from coordinates measured with stripe projection technique on three samples consisting of only substrate and BC. Three domains of each sample had been measured and three CAD models based on randomly selected surfaces of each domain were made, resulting in 27 CAD models. The CAD models were used in the 3D FE simulations also simulating a cooling from 1100 °C to 100 °C.

The results showed that the 2D simulations corresponds to published assertions about a stress inversion after TGO growth and that cracking will propagate from one peak to another, presuming the roughness of the TGO can be expressed as a wave. No conclusions of differences between spraying methods of the BC could be drawn.

The stress inversion phenomenon was also found in the 3D simulations. By inspecting the TGO/TC-interface profile in different sections of a 3D model, difficulties in predicting the stress behaviour in a TBC with 2D were explained. No differences in stresses in relation to the BC roughness could be stated.