Study of the Wear and Corrosion Performance of Hard Coatings Applied by Different Processes on Low Carbon Steel

Abstract

Most of materials used in applications that require high wear resistance also undergo corrosive action of the service environment. The damage caused by the combination of both processes on the materials leads to huge economic losses in industry. Hard coatings are widely used as engineering solution to increase the lifetime of components operating in conditions of wear combined with corrosion. Nowadays, the most versatile techniques for applying such coatings are welding and thermal spraying. This work evaluates and compares the properties of coatings obtained by thermal spraying and welding using selected feeding materials. The performance of the coatings in corrosion and erosive wear tests is discussed. From the erosion tests performed for impact angle of 90°, a similar performance for the thermally sprayed tungsten carbide coatings and the welded stainless steel coatings with higher input energy was observed. Welded samples presented the best performance in corrosion test.