Wear behaviour of nanocrystalline Fe88Si12 alloy has been investigated in water environment compared with the coarse grained counterpart. The friction coefficient of the Fe88Si12 alloy changes slightly with the grain size. The wear resistance is enhanced as the grain size decreases first and then reduces when the grain size continues to decrease, although the hardness of the Fe88Si12 alloy decreases monotonically with the grain size. It is contrary to the predications of Archard’s formula. The best wear resistance of Fe88Si12 alloy with grain size of 40？nm in our present work is attributed to the proper grain boundary volume fraction and composite phase structures of disordered B2 and ordered D03. 1. Introduction In recent decades, how to improve the wear resistance of engineering materials with lubricant has received much attention. Fretting is often an origin of catastrophic failures or loss of functionality in many engineering applications, such as bolted mechanical joints, stacks of objects in transport, and electrical connectors in vibrating machinery and so on. Lots of researchers tried to develop novel wear resistance materials for application in water environment because of pollution caused by oil hydraulic systems [1–3]. Since water has low viscosity and poor lubricity, many conventional materials used in oil hydraulics cannot be used in water condition. The nanocrystalline materials are of great scientific importance because of the small grain size and significant grain boundaries (GB) volume fraction. Correspondingly, their physical and chemical properties, which are highly sensitive to their microstructure, suggest various potential structure and engineering applications [4–6]. The friction and wear properties of the nanocrystalline materials also have received considerable interest due to the high hardness compared with the coarse grained counterparts [7–10]. Takagi et al. [11], Jeong et al. [12], and Han et al. [13] indicated that the friction coefficient and wear rate of the nanostructured metals and alloys were not only decided by grain size, but also influenced by morphology, phase structure. Although some studies had been undertaken to investigate the tribological behaviour of the nanocrystalline metals and alloys, there seem to be only a few reports on the tribological properties of the nanocrystalline metals and alloys in water condition. In the present work, the wear behaviour of the bulk nanocrystalline alloy, which was successfully prepared by combustion synthesis technique [14], was comparatively studied using a conventional
References
[1]
R. W？sche and D. Klaffke, “Ceramic particulate composites in the system SiC-TiC-TiB2 sliding against SiC and Al2O3 under water,” Tribology International, vol. 32, no. 4, pp. 197–206, 1999.
[2]
Y. S. Zhang and Z. Han, “Fretting wear behavior of nanocrystalline surface layer of pure copper under oil lubrication,” Tribology Letters, vol. 27, no. 1, pp. 53–59, 2007.
[3]
J. Jia, Q. Ma, J. Lu, and B. Wang, “Reciprocating sliding friction and wear property of Fe3Si based alloys containing Cu in water lubrication,” Tribology Letters, vol. 30, no. 2, pp. 113–121, 2008.
[4]
M. A. Meyers, A. Mishra, and D. J. Benson, “Mechanical properties of nanocrystalline materials,” Progress in Materials Science, vol. 51, no. 4, pp. 427–556, 2006.
[5]
R. O. Scattergood, C. C. Koch, K. L. Murty, and D. Brenner, “Strengthening mechanisms in nanocrystalline alloys,” Materials Science and Engineering A, vol. 493, no. 1-2, pp. 3–11, 2008.
[6]
L. Liu, Y. Li, and F. Wang, “Influence of micro-structure on corrosion behavior of a Ni-based superalloy in 3.5% NaCl,” Electrochimica Acta, vol. 52, no. 25, pp. 7193–7202, 2007.
[7]
R. Mishra, B. Basu, and R. Balasubramaniam, “Effect of grain size on the tribological behavior of nanocrystalline nickel,” Materials Science and Engineering A, vol. 373, no. 1-2, pp. 370–373, 2004.
[8]
Y. Lin, J. Lu, L. Wang, T. Xu, and Q. Xue, “Surface nanocrystallization by surface mechanical attrition treatment and its effect on structure and properties of plasma nitrided AISI 321 stainless steel,” Acta Materialia, vol. 54, no. 20, pp. 5599–5605, 2006.
[9]
L. Wang, J. Ma, J. Yang, Q. Bi, L. Fu, and W. Liu, “Dry-sliding tribological properties of a nano-eutectic Fe1.87C0.13 alloy,” Wear, vol. 268, no. 7-8, pp. 991–995, 2010.
[10]
K. R. Sriraman, S. G. Sundara Raman, and S. K. Seshadri, “Synthesis and evaluation of hardness and sliding wear resistance of electrodeposited nanocrystalline Ni-W alloys,” Materials Science and Engineering A, vol. 418, no. 1-2, pp. 303–311, 2006.
[11]
M. Takagi, H. Ohta, T. Imura, Y. Kawamura, and A. Inoue, “Wear properties of nanocrystalline aluminum alloys and their composites,” Scripta Materialia, vol. 44, no. 8-9, pp. 2145–2148, 2001.
[12]
D. H. Jeong, U. Erb, K. T. Aust, and G. Palumbo, “The relationship between hardness and abrasive wear resistance of electrodeposited nanocrystalline Ni-P coatings,” Scripta Materialia, vol. 48, no. 8, pp. 1067–1072, 2003.
[13]
Z. Han, Y. Zhang, and K. Lu, “Friction and wear behaviors of nanostructured metals,” Journal of Materials Science and Technology, vol. 24, no. 4, pp. 483–494, 2008.
[14]
L. Fu, J. Yang, Q. Bi, J. Ma, and W. Liu, “Combustion synthesis and characterization of bulk nanocrystalline Fe88Si12 alloy,” IEEE Transactions on Nanotechnology, vol. 9, no. 2, pp. 218–222, 2010.
[15]
G. Palumbo, U. Erb, and K. T. Aust, “Triple line disclination effects on the mechanical behaviour of materials,” Scripta Metallurgica et Materiala, vol. 24, no. 12, pp. 2347–2350, 1990.
[16]
J. F. Archard, “Contact and rubbing of flat surfaces,” Journal of Applied Physics, vol. 24, no. 8, pp. 981–988, 1953.
[17]
C. C. Koch, I. A. Ovid'ko, S. Seal, and S. Veprek, Structural Nanocrystalline Materials: Fundamentals and Applications, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 2007.
[18]
Y. Toru and H. Peter, “Analysis of XPS spectra of Fe2+and Fe3+ions in oxide materials,” Applied Surface Science, vol. 254, no. 8, pp. 2441–2449, 2009.
[19]
A. R. Lashin, O. Schneeweiss, and Y. Houbaert, “Effect of ambient air pressure on the oxidation kinetics of Fe-6 at.% Si alloy,” Corrosion Science, vol. 50, no. 9, pp. 2580–2587, 2008.
[20]
M. D. G. M. M. Cesar and M. J. Mantel, “Effect of the temperature and dew point of the decarburization process on the oxide subscale of a 3% silicon steel,” Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials, vol. 254-255, pp. 337–339, 2003.
[21]
P. Lej？ek, O. Schneeweiss, and A. Fraczkiewicz, “Grain boundary segregation in an ordered Fe-24at.%Si alloy,” Surface Science, vol. 566–568, no. 1–3, pp. 826–831, 2004.
[22]
U. Wolff, F. Schneider, K. Mummert, and L. Schultz, “Stability and electrochemical properties of passive layers on Fe-Si alloys,” Corrosion, vol. 56, no. 12, pp. 1195–1201, 2000.
[23]
A. Atkinson, “A theoretical analysis of the oxidation of Fe-Si alloys,” Corrosion Science, vol. 22, no. 2, pp. 87–102, 1982.
