“…Duplex coatings, consisting of a nitrided load support layer and a hard coating top layer, are now available on a mass production scale [1,2], and are in use, or being considered for use, in a wide range of applications [3][4][5][6][7][8][9]. Various factors that influence the functioning of this type of coating system have been suggested, such as an unfavorable stress state with the nitrided layer [10,11], extra precipitations along the hard coating-prenitriding layer [12][13][14], or black layer formation by denitriding [1,15,16].…”