Application of laser surface alloying for improvement of wear resistance of bearing steels working at severe conditions and of light titanium alloys

The task of wear resistance improvement for bearing steels working at high loads in water medium was solved by laser alloying with Sn. The modified zone contains up to 22 wt.% Sn, which is used as a solid lubricant during exploitation. As a result the bearing race's durability is increased 2.5 times. The combination of laser alloying from a nitrogen jet with surface plastic deformation (SPD) was used to produce Titanium nitride layers with minimum roughness, no cracks, and no residual stresses. The wear resistance tests showed the real possibility of using the developed method to manufacture friction joints from light Titanium alloys