Structural, hardness and tribological behavior of TiAlNO coatings prepared by sputtering

Abstract

ABSTRACTAluminum titanium oxynitride (TiAlNO) coatings were deposited on 316 steel substrates by the sputtering technique, varying the nitrogen flow from 2.5, 5, 7.5 to 10 sccm, and maintaining constant at 12 sccm the flow argon gas. We used targets of titanium and alumina with 99.995% purity. The hardness and tribological analyses were determined by Vickers microhardness and tribology (tribometer pin-disc), respectively. The results show that the coating with a nitrogen flow of 10 sccm had the lowest volumetric wear (2.047738693 mm3) and the maximum value of hardness (11.2 GPa). Analysis of X-ray diffraction evidenced the presence of three crystalline phases: Ti2N, Al2O3 and TiO2. It can be observed that by increasing the nitrogen flow, the portion of semi-Ti2N phase increases, Al2O3 decreases and TiO2 remains almost constant, and also producing a change in crystallographic orientation with reference to the Ti2N phase. Crystal grain sizes were estimated by X-ray diffraction Fourier line profile analysis using Warren–Averbach method. This analysis showed a grain size between 5 and 15 nm. Raman spectroscopy results show the presence of the TiO2 phase which corroborated the X-ray diffraction results.