Wear behaviour of iron boride coatings produced by VPS technique on carbon steels

The vacuum plasma spray (VPS) technique is a useful tool for designing the characteristics of the coatings and, thus, the tribological properties of coated components. In the present paper, the wear properties of iron boride coatings produced by means of VPS technique on AISI 1040 steel samples were evaluated as a function of their microstructural characteristics. One coating type was obtained by using Fe2B pure powder, the other with differentiated FeB + alpha-Fe blends, with the FeB content increasing and alpha-Fe content decreasing from the matrix to the surface. Wear tests were performed by means of a tribometer in block-on-ring configuration, without lubricant and in air, by using 40- and 60-N coupling loads and 0.8- and 1.6-m s^−1 sliding velocities. On Fe2B coated samples, wear is essentially oxidative until the failure of the coating, the fragments of which cause a third body abrasion. On the FeB + alpha-Fe coated samples the wear mechanism is mainly oxidative and the coating totally wears out without spalling as a consequence of its graded structure, which succeeds in both improving the adhesion of the coating to the substrate and reducing the residual stress at the coating–substrate interface.