Improved Adhesion and Tribological Properties of AlTiN-TiSiN Coatings Deposited by DCMS and HiPIMS on Nitrided Tool Steels

Adrián Claver,Francesc Montalá,Jonathan Fernández De Ara,Victor Cot,Jesús J Randulfe,Jose A García,José F Palacio,Eluxka Almandoz,Carles Colominas

doi:10.3390/coatings11101175

Adrián Claver, Francesc Montalá + Show 7 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/coatings11101175

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Abstract

Hard coatings, such as AlTiN-TiSiN, deposited by Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD) techniques are widely used in industrial applications to protect and increase the lifetime of industrial components, such as cutting tools, dies, and forming tools. Despite their great properties, such as high hardness and wear and oxidation resistance, they are limited in cases of severe conditions due to the poor adhesion between the coating and the substrate. Duplex treatments have commonly been used to improve the adhesive properties of PVD coatings, especially those of the cathodic arc evaporation type. The purpose of this study is to achieve coatings with the good properties of the Magnetron Sputtering processes but with higher adhesion than that achieved with these techniques, thus achieving coatings that can be used under the most severe conditions. In this work, an AlTiN-TiSiN coating was deposited by a combination of DC Magnetron Sputtering (DCMS) and High-Power Impulse Magnetron Sputtering (HiPIMS) after a gas nitriding pretreatment on 1.2379 and Vanadis 4 tool steels. Mechanical (ultra-microhardness and scratch tests) and tribological tests were carried out to study the improvement in the properties of the coating. Duplex-treated samples showed improved adhesion between the coating and the substrate, with second critical load (Lc2) values greater than 100 N. Furthermore, they showed great toughness and wear resistance. These results show that this type of coating technique could be used in the most extreme applications and that they can compete with other techniques and coatings that to date they have not been able to compete with.

Highlights

Hard coatings have been widely used to protect and increase the lifetime of industrial components, such as cutting tools, dies, and forming tools
The aim of this study is to improve the adhesion and tribological properties of duplex treatments formed by gas nitriding and hard coatings deposited by magnetron sputtering techniques
In this study, nitrided high-quality tool steels were coated with AlTiN-TiSiN coatings deposited by a combination of High-Power Impulse Magnetron Sputtering (HiPIMS) and DC Magnetron Sputtering (DCMS)

Summary

Introduction

Hard coatings have been widely used to protect and increase the lifetime of industrial components, such as cutting tools, dies, and forming tools Their excellent properties, such as high hardness, toughness, good tribological properties, and wear and oxidation resistance, make them ideal for applications in which industrial components are under high and constant loads [1,2,3]. This family contains different coatings (e.g., AlTiN, TiN, CrN, and AlCrN), and the addition of metallic or non-metallic elements, such as Ti, Si, Al, and C, and the deposition parameters have a strong influence on their physical, chemical, and mechanical properties [4,5,6]. Different studies have shown that TiSiN/TiAlN multilayer coatings have a higher hardness and lower friction coefficient than TiSiN and TiAlN monolayer coatings alone [7,24]

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