Review Reports

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

In this manuscript, Cu35Ni25Co25Cr15 HEA was coated on the surface of a pure Cu substrate by plasma transverse arc welding. The microstructure of the coating was characterized, and it's mechanical and wear properties were tested. In addition, the effects of welding current on the wear behavior of a Cu35Ni25Co25Cr15 HEA coating were investigated.

 

After a careful peer-reviewing process, I must inform you that, the subject of this paper is interesting and can be considered for publication in the journal after a MAJOR REVISION. I believe that the paper contains relevant information for the scientific community focused on recent advances in HEA alloys and coatings for industrial steel parts and structures. I believe that the results are informative for engineers and scientists but must be well organized and improved in the next revision(s). Therefore, there are some questions about this submission and some revisions are necessary for this work. The major/minor issues are indicated as follows:

 

1.    The abstract is not well written. Some details of the experimental processes focused on phase analysis and the PTS welding process were missed in the abstract. Please revise this section. The last two lines in the abstract must be improved to increase its readability: “The importance of this work and/or future developments/trends”.

 

2.    Despite the large bibliography, the Introduction is sparse. It should, to a greater extent, refer to the problem that has been described in some respects in previous publications. Use these references to provide a better introduction: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11666-022-01354-8; https://doi.org/10.3390/coatings12030372.

 

3.    The state-of-the-art needs to be described more in the “Introduction”. Please revise the last paragraph of this section. Also, the new findings related to this work should be stated in the introduction clearly.

 

4.     Please provide the manufacturer/model/code and also the manufacturer country of the raw materials as well as all testing equipment used for evaluations.

 

5.     Authors must show which questions/problems have been answered in this work. In this case, the correct and detailed information about this study focused on Cu35Ni25Co25Cr15 HEA coatings must be provided in this manuscript.

 

6.     In this manuscript, results are well presented, but a discussion on the obtained results must be completely provided in this manuscript. As can be seen, a “comprehensive” and “comparative” discussion especially wear properties and welding process of Cu35Ni25Co25Cr15 HEA coating are missed in this work. This should be provided as well.

 

7.     ICDD reference codes must be provided for each detected phase of all XRD tests.

 

8.     Please provide major findings in the “Conclusions” section with a bullet-point style.

 

9.     There is no description of the future plans for research in the first part of the “Conclusions” section. This should be completed in this section.

 

10.  Recently published references are beneficial for this work. Please check and use new references focused on your work.

 

11.  Also, please double-check and revise the reference list according to the journal requirements.

 

12.  As can be seen, typos and minor grammar errors (including punctuation) and formatting mistakes have existed in the main text of this manuscript. A considerable number of sentences are not comprehensible, some of which can be due to typos or grammar errors. Careful proofreading is mandatory for this case.

 

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The article is about effect of welding current on wear behavior of plasma-transfer-arc-welded Cu35Ni25Co25Cr15 high-entropy alloy coating. However, some issues must to be addressed:

1. Title: is needed to simplify the title to be fully understandable!
2. Abstract: Please start by expressing the aim of this paper, followed by the rest of the information. Typically, the abstract should provide a broad overview of the entire project, summarize the results, and present the implications of the research or what it adds to its field.
3. Please rewrite the introduction section and improve reference section by adding latest references from 2019-2022. The state-of-the-art is weak and doubt about the novelty and originality.
4. The results are merely presented, not properly discussed. Please add explanations for the observed changes. Please give an extended discussion on the obtained results and correlate your findings with previous literature studies and prospective applications.
5. More analysis and interpretation of the results should be added for a clearer understanding of observed experimental phenomena.
6. The authors must to provide some details about importance of the research and their applicability.
7. Please rewrite the conclusions in a more quantitative form and enhance the clarity of the conclusion section in order to highlight the results obtained.
8. General check-up and correction of the English language is suggested. There are still some minor typos and grammatical errors.

The author needs to address the abovementioned points for the betterment of the manuscript.

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

1. The paper looks like a converted Chinese to English manuscript of the author's earlier work [13]. I suggest clearly stating the highlights of work.

2. The literature review of the manuscript is very poor. Add recent studies, problem statement, objective/contributions.

3. Section 2, is very poorly presented. There is no proper methodology. I suggest adding a flowchart to explain the methodology.

4. Add future scope in conclusion section.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The revised manuscript looks fine and can be accepted now in Coatings. 

Reviewer 2 Report

The article is suitable for publication.

Reviewer 3 Report

All my comments are addressed.