Effect of surface attrition on hardness on the hardness and wear properties of 304 stainless steels

Abstract

The occurrence of wear in austenitic stainless steel is inevitably unavoidable due to the presence of high chromium content and other alloying elements that hinder the implementation of surface treatment process. This process is usually use to improve the hardness and wear properties of steels and alloys by diffusing hard protected layer on the surface of the material. This paper investigates the effect of surface attrition on the hardness and wear properties of paste boronized 304 stainless steel. Surface attrition treatment was applied onto the surface of 304 stainless steel before paste boronizing was conducted at temperature of 850°C for 8 hours holding times. The microstructure of the boronized samples before and after surface attrition treatment was then observed and recorded in order to compare the phase constituent and boride layer thickness. The hardness of each phases was then evaluated using Vickers microhardness test and the wear resistance test of both paste boronized sample and surface attrited samples after boronizing was performed using pin on disk test. The microstructure results show that there are presences of both FeB and Fe2B phases on the surface of Pa-B850 and Pa-SB with boride layer thickness improvement of 3 times compared to untreated samples. This lead to enhancement of both hardness and wear resistance of the paste boronized samples due to better protection on the surface of the 304 stainless steel. The improvement of wear and hardness properties of 304 stainless steel could introduce new application that could be exposed to environment containing friction and wear.