||In the general objective to improve the resistance to surface dammage by mechanical actions, it is often researched to increase hardness of the superficial zone of materials. This can be achieved either by thermal, thermochemical, physical or chemical vapor deposition treatments as well as coating by thermal spraying.
There is a need therefore to measure hardness with accurate precision. This is rendered difficult because hardness varies with the applied load. In the special case of coatings, it is even more difficult because, for a large range of loads, apparent hardness is the result of both contributions of the substrate and the coating. Supplementary, it is very important to dispose of a reproductible, reliable and simple test to determine adhesion of a coating on its substrate. The conference will describe how to derive maximum informations from indentation tests and models concerning these two aspects.