Search Results (3)

The paper examines the possibility of increasing the wear and corrosion resistance of a CP-Ti surface by duplex plasma electrolytic treatment (borocarburizing and polishing). The structure and composition of diffusion layers, their microhardness, surface morphology and roughness, wear resistance during dry friction and corrosion resistance in Ringer’s solution were studied. The formation of a surface-hardened layer up to 200 μm thick with a microhardness of up to 950 HV, including carbides and a solid solution of boron and carbon, is shown. Subsequent polishing makes it possible to reduce surface roughness and remove weak areas of the porous oxide layer, which are formed during high-temperature oxidation in aqueous electrolyte vapor during borocarburizing. Changing the morphology and structural-phase composition of the CP-Ti surface helps reduce weight wear by a factor of three (the mode of frictional interaction changes from microcutting to oxidative wear) and corrosion current density by a factor of four after borocarburizing in a solution of boric acid, glycerin and ammonium chloride at 950 °C for 5 min and subsequent polishing in an ammonium fluoride solution at a voltage of 250 V for 3 min. Full article

In this paper, the performance of low-carbon steel is enhanced after introducing a borocarburized diffusion layer via double glow plasma surface alloying technology. Due to the boron-carbon gradient structure of low-carbon steel, the protective coating exhibits an excellent wear and corrosion resistance. Interestingly, the borocarburized layer consists of a 64 μm carburized layer and a 27 μm boride layer, which plays an effective role in enhancing the microhardness of borocarburized low-carbon steel, exhibiting a 1440 Vickers hardness increase in the surface microhardness of low-carbon steel. The potentiodynamic polarization measurement and impedance measurement results indicate that the boride protective film can effectively prevent aggressive chloride ions from invading the substrate, which indicates an excellent property of corrosion resistance. This systematic study paves a promising way for the future application of hard coatings in severe environments. Full article

The gas boriding process is an appropriate technique used for increasing the hardness and wear resistance of iron and steels. However, the boron halides (e.g., BCl₃, BF₃) are rarely used as a boron source during gas boriding in industry due to the toxic character of these reagents. The possibility of the use of organic compounds as a boron source in plasma assisted processes was the instigation to determine the possibility of applying these agents for gas boriding. In the present work trimethyl borate was used as an organic boron source. The use of a N₂–H₂–B(CH₃O)₃ atmosphere ensured the appropriate conditions for the simultaneous gas borocarburizing of Armco iron. The process was carried out at 1223 K (950 °C) for 2 h. The produced layer consisted of two zones: an outer zone containing a diffusion of boron atoms and an inner zone containing a diffusion of carbon atoms, under the outer zone. Due to the reduction of trimethyl borate with hydrogen, free atoms of carbon were released for the gas atmosphere. Therefore, there existed favorable conditions for carburizing. Unfortunately, the formation of a carburized layer was the reason for the difficult diffusion of boron atoms. As a consequence, the boron diffusion front was hindered, and the outer boride layer was relatively thin (ca. 7.8 µm). The boride layer contained only Fe₂B phase, which was characterized by high hardness in the range from 1103 HV_0.01 to 1546 HV_0.01. The presence of iron borides in the outer layer was also the reason for increased wear resistance in comparison with untreated Armco iron. Full article