Abstract
In this work, nitriding by Plasma Immersion Ion Implantation (PIII) treatment of low carbon steel was performed in a plasma reactor with an inductive RF source (l3.56 MHz) at low pressure in order to investigate the influence of the process conditions on the hardness and corrosion properties. A space charge sheath region is formed in front of the sample biased with a negative DC voltage. The positive ions accelerated within this sheath reach the sample with a high kinetic energy. The micro-hardness increased by ~100% for the nitrogen-implanted samples compared to the untreated one, the nitride phases (γ’-Fe4N and e-Fe2-3N) are believed to participate to the hardening. A low corrosion rate is obtained, which indicates that nitriding by PIII improves the corrosion resistance behavior. These results are particularly interesting since they have been obtained for short treatment time (2 h) and relatively low bias voltages.
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