12th Tooling Conference & Exhibition - Tooling 2022

The purpose of this study is to assess the impact of different combinations of cryogenic treatments and tempering regimes on tribological properties of Cr-V tool steel against a CuSn6 counterpart. Dry sliding wear experiments were performed using a pin-on-disk tribometer according to the Taguchi method. Tribological behaviour is investigated under four process parameters at mixed levels: cryotemperature (-75, -140, or -196°C), tempering temperature (170 or 530°C), sliding velocity (0.064, 0.128, 0.1885 m/s), and load (1, 5, 10N). According to the analysis, the minimum friction coefficient is obtained by cryotreatment at -196°C combined with 170°C tempering, with a sliding velocity of 0.064 m/s and load 5N. For the minimum counterpart´s material adhesion level, cryogenic treatment at -196°C followed by tempering at 530°C, sliding velocity of 0.1885 m/s, and applied load of 1 N are the optimum settings. The ANOVA model shows that the sliding velocity (45.2%), load (40.2%), and tempering temperature (5.3%) have statistical significance on the friction coefficient, while the load (57.8%) and tempering temperature (16.4%) have statistical significance on adhesion levels. The tribological behaviour of the steel is explained by thorough microstructural examinations using the scanning electron microscopy and microanalysis, X-ray diffraction, and transmission electron microscopy.