Laser cladding of stainless steel with Ni–Cr3C2 and Ni–WC for improving erosive–corrosive wear performance

The microstructure and the erosive–corrosive wear (ECW) performance of laser-clad Ni–Cr3C2 and Ni–WC coatings with overlapping clad tracks (OCT) on a 0.2% C martensitic stainless steel were investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), XRD, EDX techniques and ECW testing. The coating produced by completely dissolving Cr3C2 particles in laser melted pool is composed of austenite (γ) dendrites surrounded by a γ-M7C3 eutectic, whereas another one is of granular solidifying structure in which contains the incompletely dissolved WC particles. The microhardness of Ni–WC coating is higher than that of Ni–Cr3C2, about 300 HV average. The main reason of microhardness difference is that two coatings have different solidified structure. The comparison of ECW tests found that the reduction of ECW rate dose not occur with the increase of hardness. The Ni–Cr3C2 coating with lower hardness has a lower ECW rate with respect to the Ni–WC one. Both average ECW rate decreased by approximately 30% and 60% as compared to that of stainless steel substrate, and both coatings had different ECW mechanism. The increase of ECW resistance is closely related to structure state, kind and amount of carbides, microhardness and toughening ability of the clad layer.