Surface Engineering of Titanium with Nitrogen

Abstract

The possibilities for surface hardening of titanium alloys by alloying with nitrogen are reviewed. Alloying has been carried out in the solid state by plasma nitriding and in the liquid state by laser melting in nitrogen. Microstructure, hardness profiles, and fatigue and wear properties have been examined. Wear resistance was found to be greatly improved by both techniques, although at the expense of a drop in fatigue properties. Case depths of 0.1 mm were produced by plasma nitriding, while 0.5 mm case depths and a maximum hardness of 1400 HV0.1 were achieved by laser alloying.

Evaluating the effects of plasma diffusion processing and duplex diffusion/PVD-coating on the fatigue performance of Ti–6Al–4V alloy

“…The reduction in fatigue strength of diffusion treated specimens becomes more significant as the efficacy of the diffusion process improves. This behaviour confirms previous studies in which diffusion case thickness has more influence on fatigue resistance than compound layer formation [28,29].…”

Surface Hardening of Titanium by Using a Simplified Carbon and Nitrogen Diffusion Technique with Steel and Carbon Powders

“…Since mechanical components and orthopedic implants with excellent tribological properties are required for practical use, techniques to harden the surface of titanium and its alloys have attracted great interest. Surface modification has been carried out by using various methods, such as gas nitriding, 1) plasma nitriding, 2,3) plasma carburizing, 4) and laser melting. 2) These methods need special equipment and complicated process flows to produce TiC and TiN layers on the base metal.…”

“…Surface modification has been carried out by using various methods, such as gas nitriding, 1) plasma nitriding, 2,3) plasma carburizing, 4) and laser melting. 2) These methods need special equipment and complicated process flows to produce TiC and TiN layers on the base metal. Therefore, a simpler and quicker method is still desired.…”

Revisión sobre nitruraciones láser de aleaciones de titanio

“…Desde entonces hasta hoy, se han llevado a cabo un número importante de trabajos de investigación en esta área, siendo actualmente un campo muy activo en todo el mundo, como muestran las publicaciones recogidas en los últimos años. La mayor parte de las nitruraciones láser, llevadas a cabo por diversos investigadores, han empleado el láser de CO 2 como fuente de energía [17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27] . En algunos casos, se realizan procesos de nitruración utilizando un láser Nd:YAG [28][29][30][31][32][33] .…”