Fretting wear behavior of the high-carbon high-chromium X210CrW12 steel: Influence of counterbody material

The effect of counterbody material on fretting wear behavior of the high-carbon high-chromium X210CrW12 steel before and after nitriding was investigated. The transformation of hard carbides into nitrides took place during nitriding, and these nitrides acted as new types of hard phases in the nitrided layer. Two counterbody materials (GCr15 steel ball and SiC ball) were used to conduct the fretting wear tests, which contributed to a better understanding of the role of hard phases in fretting wear. The results indicated that the unnitrided samples fretted against SiC balls with much higher hardness had a much lower wear volume and coefficient of friction (CoF), and the primary carbides acted as barriers against the plastic flow of softened matrix material. For the nitrided samples, the different hardness ratios of the two counterbody materials to the nitrides (transformed carbides) led to different wear damage modes, and the samples fretted against the steel balls had higher wear volume under the low loads of 10 N and 30 N. For the samples fretted against the two counterbody materials, the carbides (or nitrides) played different roles during fretting.