The effect of ion plating on the friction and wear of Ti6Al4V alloy

Abstract The effect of noble metal ion plating on the room temperature friction and wear of Ti6Al4V was investigated. Sliding wear experiments were conducted on a linear displacement machine which enabled the determination of coefficient of friction at regular intervals. The wear experiments were performed between two titanium alloy surfaces with various ion plating and dry lubrication conditions. Test results showed that the extent of wear damage of the titanium substrate was directly related to the rate of increase of the friction coefficient and not to its value. The best wear protection was provided either by gold ion plating on one surface combined with MoS 2 lubrication or by gold ion plating on both surfaces. The former case yielded a very low friction coefficient while the latter yielded a very high one. Modes of wear were determined by scanning electron microscopy of sectioned wear specimens.