Tribological Wear Analysis of Laser Surface Treated Ti6Al4V Based on Volume Lost Evaluation

Abstract

Surface modification of materials through thermal or chemical treatments and coatings development can be used to obtain improved behavior under abrasive and adhesive wear. A great variety of surface structures with different properties can be adapted to the most demanding requirements. This is due to the high number of parameters that can be controlled in each treatment, such as the technique used, the atmosphere, the use of additive elements to the base material, the thickness of the modified layers, etc., In order to monitoring more accurately the wear conditions on the alloy, tribological tests were carried out that enable to control anytime the application parameters of a process, thus generating very accurate, reliable and easier to evaluate data, than industrial machining processes. One of the most significant wear variables in the study is the change in volume of material experienced by the sample after the sliding process. This contribution aims at assessing the volume of worn material, analyzing the tribological behavior of surface treated by laser Ti6Al4V samples.