Investigations into the abrasive wear of powder plasma-arc surface welds

The hard surfacing of precutting edges on buckets from the field of mining was to be improved with regard to its wearability. A powder plasma-arc weld surfacing installation with which surface welds were manufactured using different filler metals and with variation of the welding parameters was set up. Various other alloys (also with spherodised carbides) were used in addition to the WC3.9 + 40NiSi3B2 filler metal (a powder with tungsten carbide as the hard material and a matrix similar to brazing solder). Wear investigations were conducted on the hard surfacings in the laboratory using a Harworth-ZIS machine and during operation by measuring the length removal on components. Some alloys achieved even better wear intensities than sintered hard metal with 12% cobalt.