The Wear Mechanism of DLC Films at Variable Working Conditions

The Diamond-like carbon coating (DLC) was derived by the PVCD method on the 45 steel surfaces. The frictional properties and fatigue failure of 45 steel with the DLC films were investigated under three different conditions including full contact condition, horizontal reciprocating movements and vertical reciprocating movements. It was found that (a) at full contact conditions: the increase in the load leads to the initial decrease in the frictional coefficient and then increase, and a lowest frictional coefficient of 0.205 appears at 250N; (b) at horizontal reciprocating conditions: the slow decrease in the frictional coefficient was caused by the increase in load, and frictional coefficients of 0.213 and 0.178 appears at 100N and 300N, respectively; (c) at vertical reciprocating conditions: the frictional coefficient was initially enhanced and then followed by a decrease trend; the highest frictional coefficients of 0.640 appears at load of 200N. The wear rate was slightly enhanced as the load is lower than 200N, and was sharply increased with the further increase in the load. The lowest wear rate was 1.55 mg/10000r, and the highest wear rate was 15.6mg/10000r.