Abstract
The aim of the research is to elucidate the patterns of modification of the elemental and phase composition, defective substructure, and mechanical and tribological properties of a carbon steel during a combined treatment in a single vacuum cycle, including deposition of niobium and silicon films on the steel surface and irradiation of the film/substrate system with an intense pulsed electron beam. The formation in a single vacuum cycle of Si–Nb films 1 μm thick each on the 40Cr steel specimens was carried out on the COMPLEX setup by the magnetron (Si) and arc evaporation (Nb) methods with plasma assistance. High-speed melting of the (Si–Nb) film/(40Cr steel) substrate system was carried out by an intense pulsed electron beam. The mode of irradiation of the (Si + Nb) film/(40Cr steel) substrate system by an intense pulsed electron beam (50 J/cm2, 200 μs, and 3 pulses) is revealed that allows the formation of the surface layer characterized by the high hardness equal to 9600 MPa (exceeding the hardness of the 40Cr steel in the initial (ferrite-perlite) state by a factor of 3.3) and the wear resistance that exceeds by more than 15 times the wear resistance of the 40Cr steel in the initial state. It has been shown that high strength and tribological properties of the steel are due to the formation of particles of the strengthening phase (Nb5Si3, Nb3.61Si0.39, Nb08Fe02, SiC, and NbO2) and a relatively large (up to 30 μm) thickness of the strengthened layer.
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