Erosion wear of stainless steel by abrasives entrained in a water jet

Erosion of stainless steel by abrasives entrained in a water jet often threats industrial equipment, such as the turbine blades of hydraulic power generators. It degrades system efficiency and increases maintenance costs. The current study investigates the erosion of SUS304 and SUS410 by garnet and quartz sand entrained in a water jet. The correlation between erosion time, impinging velocity, impinging angle, abrasive mass fraction, abrasive characteristics, and the material, shown as a result of the experiment, demonstrates that the erosion mechanism is ductile mode, that the material is eroded by micro-cutting, extrusion, and forging associated with severe, localized, plastic deformation. SUS410 possesses slightly better erosion resistance due to its higher yield strength. The wear fates of both materials are mainly affected by the impinging velocity and angle. The accumulative weight loss is proportional to the abrasive mass flow. The maximum wear occurs at an angle between 30 and 45 degrees. Higher velocity results in more extensive erosion wear.