Assessment of Wear Properties under Dry Sliding Conditions on AISI 301LN Austenitic Stainless Steel by Plasma Nitriding Process

In industry, mechanical components must operate under conditions conditions such as variable load, speed, temperature and various chemical environments. Materials are selected depending on their application. They are selected for commercial availability, cost and properties such as strength, hardness etc. Many engineering errors are due to fatigue, corrosion and poor wear resistance occurring on its surface. This causes cracks in the surface that shortens the service life of the material. Also, the surfaces of materials are exposed to strong thermal, chemical and shock loads. Chosen for this research work, AISI 301LN materials have low surface hardness and poor wear properties, which can limit their applications were components mate each other. AISI 301LN stainless steel was treated with plasma nitriding at a low temperature of about 650°C. It was observed that a mixture of ferrites and gradually nitrogenous matter accumulates in the following layers namely iron nitride. Further nitriding was carried out to 20 hrs, 40 hrs, 60 hrs and the specimen were named as PL1, PL2 and PL3 respectively. It was observed that Cr-N layer were formed on the outer surface. Wear tests were carried out on a tribological wear test machine to study the wear behavior. A comparison is made between treated and untreated specimens. The microstructures are investigated with scanning electron microscope.