Tribological Study of HVOF Sprayed Tungsten Carbide Coated Stainless Steel

Abstract

Corrosion and Wear, or a combination of both, are the main causes of degradation of metals used in the various industrial sectors. Degradation of the metals can be slowed down by adding a layer of resistant coating on the metal surface. This coating separates the base metal from a corrosive environment, reduces wear, and improves the appearance of the metal. The workpiece after coating becomes a composite that has properties far better than the substrate alone. There are various coating techniques, HVOF is one of the most important and widely used processes to protect the metals from wear, corrosion by providing hard and dense coatings. WC coating done by the high-velocity oxy-fuel (HVOF) spray method is the widely used method for providing a layer of corrosive resistance to a wide range of materials that are used in many different industries. In this study, Tungsten carbide (WC-12CO) Coating, HVOF Spray method was studied in great detail. Tungsten Carbide coating was done on a SUS400 Stainless steel substrate using HVOF Spray Process. An, Experiment was done to analyze the various effect of different parameters namely, oxygen rate, propane (fuel) rate, powder rate, spray distance on hardness, and surface roughness of a SUS 400 Stainless Steel substrate. Process optimization was done by using Taguchi and ANOVA methods. It was found that achieving maximum hardness was greatly dependent on propane (fuel) rate followed by powder rate, spray distance, and oxygen rate. The hardness decreases with the increasing fuel rate. And, achieving minimum surface roughness was greatly dependent on spray distance followed by oxygen rate, propane (fuel) rate, powder rate. Surface Roughness increases with increasing spray distance.