Laser gas-assisted processing of carbon coated and TiC embedded Ti–6Al–4V alloy surface

Abstract

Laser gas-assisted treatment of Ti–6Al–4V alloy surface is carried out. The alloy surface is initially coated by a carbon layer, in which the TiC particles are embedded prior to laser processing of the surface. The carbon coating with the presence of TiC particles on the workpiece surface is expected to result in carbonitride compound in the surface vicinity after the laser treatment process. Optical and scanning electron microscopes are used to examine the morphological and the metallurgical changes in the laser treated layer. The residual stress formed in the surface region after the laser treatment process is critical for the practical applications of the resulting surface. Therefore, the residual stress formed in the laser treated region is predicted from the analytically equation. The X-ray diffraction technique is incorporated to obtain the residual stress formed in the surface region. It is found that the residual stress predicted agrees with the X-ray diffraction data. The dense structures consisting of TiCxN1−x, TiNx, Ti2N, and TiC compounds are formed in the surface region of the treated layer. This, in turn, significantly increases the microhardness at the surface.