Rare earth effect on microstructure, mechanical and tribological properties of CoCrW coatings

Eight different CoCrW coatings doped with rare earth oxide were deposited by supersonic plasma spraying (SPS). Environmental scanning electron microscopy, microhardness tester, X-ray diffractometer, and self-developed tribometer for high temperature were employed to investigate the properties of sprayed coatings. The results show that rare earth can refine the microstructure effectively, and make the element distribution uniform, which leads to the increase of average microhardness and the corresponding decrease of fluctuation range of sectioned surface of SPS coatings. Furthermore, the rare earth can reduce the friction coefficient between the SPS coating and glass during the sliding process at about 973 K largely, and the mechanism of anti-friction is also discussed. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.