Evolution of Fretting Wear Behaviors and Mechanisms of 20CrMnTi Steel after Carburizing

In this paper, the fretting wear properties of 20CrMnTi steel, a common material for a rocker bracket, was discussed for the first time after it was suffered carburizing treatment. Subsequently, the fretting wear behaviors of virgin, quenched, and carburized states were studied. The effect of loads (corresponding to different engine power output) and reciprocating frequencies (corresponding to different engine speed) on wear behaviors and mechanisms of carburized specimen were further discussed. The results showed that the coefficient of friction (CoF) and wear volume loss (WVL) of the carburized specimens were significantly lower than that of virgin and quenched states. During the wear test, the surface CoF decreased gradually with the increase of applied load, while the linear correlation trend was not observed with the increase of fretting frequency as it showed an increase first and then a decrease. It was observed that the WVL increased gradually with the increase of load and frequency. With an increase of the load, the wear mechanism gradually deteriorated from the initial adhesive wear to the mixed wear mechanism. When the load was high, the oxidative wear became more severe. However, no significant effect of frequency was observed on the wear mechanism.