Structure and Properties of Nitride Coatings Based on Ti and Cr Synthesized by PIII&D Technique

Abstract

The results of studies of the structure, stress, and hardness of Ti–N, Cr–N and Ti–Cr–N coatings deposited by the PIII&D method using the rectilinear vacuum-arc plasma filter are presented. X-ray structural analysis was used to study the effect of the pulse bias potential amplitude in the range from 0.5 to 1.5 kV on the characteristics of the coatings. In accordance with the composition of the cathode, the coatings have the nanocrystalline cubic structure TiN, CrN or solid solution (Ti, Cr)N (structural type NaCl) with axial texture [110]. The content of Cr in (Ti, Cr)N coatings is 1.5 times higher than in the cathode. It was found that the change of the pulse bias potential amplitude practically does not affect the elemental composition of the coatings. The level of compression stress and the size of crystallites in (Ti, Cr)N coatings are less than in TiN coatings obtained under similar conditions. All TiN and (Ti, Cr)N coatings have a high hardness of 29–36 GPa.