Sliding wear of composite WC-stainless steel welded hardfacings at room and elevated temperatures.

What is it about?

This paper highlights the sliding wear of plasma transferred arc welded (PTAW) hardfacing, made of the AISI 316L stainless steel and tungsten carbide (WC/W2C), under 20, 300 and 500 degrees Celsius.

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Why is it important?

This paper is important from two aspects: 1. It was shown that it was possible to obtain welded stainless steel-based hardfacings, reinforced by at least 30 vol.% primary WC/W2C particles (the majority of other authors reported the dissolution of the ex-situ added WC/W2C reinforcement in the steel matrix during welding). 2. It was demonstrated that the positive effect of WC/W2C reinforcement on the sliding wear resistance of the hardfacings was inversely proportional to the temperature (i.e., the higher was the temperature, the lower was the difference in the resistance to sliding wear between the WC-reinforced hardfacing and bulk AISI 316L steel, what was used as the reference). Moreover, at 500 C the sample from AISI 316L steel showed better resistance to wear, than the above-mentioned composite hardfacing.

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