Tribological investigation of MoS2 coatings deposited on the laser textured surface

► MoS2 solid lubricant coating was fabricated by a combination technology of laser texturing and hot-pressing. ► We examine influences of preparation methods and texture density on the wear life and wears mechanism of coatings. ► The coating by hot pressing on textured surface shows excellent tribological behavior. ► Increasing texture density will increase wear life of coating. Deposition of solid lubricant on the textured surface is an effective way to improve tribological properties of counterparts. In this paper, MoS2 solid lubricant coating was fabricated by a combination technology of laser texturing and hot-pressing. The influences of preparation methods and texture density on the tribological properties of coatings were also investigated. Research results show that a thicker and denser coating having better adhesion with the textured steel substrate was fabricated by this combination technology, which results in excellent tribological properties. The friction coefficients of hot pressed coatings are less than 0.1. The wear life of hot pressed coating can be reached 90min with a texture density of 8.5%, which is 15 times higher than that of coating fabricated by burnishing. In addition, the wear life of hot pressed coating significantly increases with the increase of texture density. The possible friction reduction and wear resistant mechanisms are discussed.