Synergistic interactions between wear and corrosion of Ti-16Mo orthopedic alloy

Abstract In this study, corrosion, wear, and tribocorrosion of Ti-16Mo alloy manufactured by powder metallurgy (PM) in phosphate-buffered saline are investigated. The results indicate that the corrosion rate of Ti-16Mo alloy increases about 100 times from 0.00009 mm/yr to 0.00851 mm/yr under the tribocorrosion condition. Also, corrosion accelerates wear loss, and wear increment rate due to the corrosion (4.7715 mm/yr) of Ti-16Mo alloy is about 40% of pure mechanical wear rate (11.78 mm/yr). Compared with as-cast pure Ti (23.70999 mm/yr) and Ti-6Al-4 V (17.12003 mm/yr), Ti-16Mo alloy exhibits the lowest materials loss of 16.56001 mm/yr making it become a promising alloy for bone-tissue applications.