Corrosion and wear behavior of Ti-30Zr alloy for dental implants

Abstract

In this paper, the corrosion, wear and corrosion-wear behaviors of Ti-30Zr alloy were investigated in Hank’s solution. The corrosion and wear behaviors were evaluated by CHI 660C electrochemical workstation and TE66 abrasion tester, and surface morphologies were viewed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The results indicated the superior corrosion-wear sensitivity of Ti-30Zr alloy. The corrosion-wear behavior of Ti-30Zr alloy was affected by the interaction between corrosion and wear. The wear accelerated corrosion induced a shift in corrosion potential towards the negative values, and corrosion current density increased with wear by three orders of magnitude. The wear volume of Ti-30Zr alloy rose with the applied load in the absence and presence of corrosion. On the other hand, wear volume acquired without corrosion was smaller than that obtained under corrosion-wear conditions since, wear was aggravated by corrosion. However, the friction coefficient (0.41–0.53) obtained with corrosion was lower than that acquired without corrosion (0.65–0.77), mainly attributed to formation of passivation film with certain lubrication effects. SEM morphologies of worn surface revealed dominant wear mechanism based on two-body abrasive wear, which occurred during wear and corrosion-wear processes. Overall, the mechanical wear played a key role in material loss under corrosion-wear conditions.