Unconventional Glow Discharge Nitriding of 316L Austenitic Steel

Abstract

This work presents the results of investigations of unconventionally glow-discharge nitrided 316L austenitic steel. The process of nitriding was performed using a variety of variants of sample orientation in glow-discharge chamber. The samples subject to nitriding were located directly on cathode, on the surface isolated from both cathode and anode, in so-called ‘plasma potential’, while the part of the samples with this orientation were additionally covered with screens to supported nitriding process. In order to evaluate the efficiency of various variants of nitriding, the following investigations were conducted: hardness test, element distribution profile within surface layer, metallographic tests, tribological and corrosion resistance tests.