Solid particle erosion of aluminium nitride thin film deposited by radio frequency magnetron sputtering technique on AA6061

• Published in: Materials today : proceedings 2021, Vol.46, p.6673-6677
• Main Authors: Prakash Sharma, Ved, Walia, Arun, Kumar, Mukesh, Shukla, V.N.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: AA6061; Air jet erosion; AlN thin film; RF sputtering; Wear
• ISSN: 2214-7853; 2214-7853
• DOI: 10.1016/j.matpr.2021.04.134

Erosive wear is a severe problem of material degradation which can cause premature failure of the component in several industries like aviation, fuel tanks, gas turbine blades and the automobile sector etc. A composite system of a protective layer over the surface of base material can be a viable solution to reduce erosive wear. In this study, erosive wear properties of bare as well as AlN thin film coated AA6061 Aluminum alloy are analyzed using Air jet erosion machine. AlN thin film has been developed on Aluminium alloy (AA6061) by Radio Frequency (RF) magnetron sputtering technique with Al as target material and under Ar & N2 atmosphere. The coating is characterized by Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope (FE-SEM), Atomic Force Microscope (AFM) and Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (EDS). Erosion test is performed at 30° and 90° impact angle with silica sand having an average particle size of 125 µm is used as erodent. Surface morphology of eroded surfaces and mass loss are analyzed. It was observed that AlN thin film possesses excellent resistance to solid particle erosion in comparison to AA6061 aluminium alloy.