Sliding Abrasive Wear Characteristics of Steels with Different Hardness

In a numerous cases of industrial application there exist usually two kinds of abrasivewear produced by rolling and sliding of abrasive particles at the same time. Therefore,the slidingabrasive wear is a common phenomenon as well,which was still less reported in literatures.Through the studies of sliding abrasive wear for the steels of different hardness matching with SiCabrasive particles on a reciprocating wear testing machine it was found that the surface hardness ofsteels is the main influencing factor of their wear-resistance. When the hardness is higher than 734HV,the wear resistance is very sensitive to the hardness.For instance,when the hardness isincreased from 7 34 HV to 830 HV,the wear-resistance can be improved about 1 00%,although theroughness of wear surface shows a little increasement,the wear mechanism is micro-cutting at thistime.When the hardness is lower than 734HV,it is less sensitive to the wear-resistance.Forinstance,when the hardness is increased from 317 HV to 734 HV,the wear-resistance is improvedonly 50%,but the roughness of wear surface decreases rapidly. In this case,the wear mechanismis micro-cutting dominantly accompanying with delamination induced by strain fatigue. Therefore,the higher surface hardness of steels is the key point for getting an ideal life-time in many industrialapplications.