Microstructural evolution of wear-resistant FeCrB and FeCrNiCoB coating alloys during high-energy mechanical attrition

Mechanical milling/attrition provides a convenient scope of simulating the microstructural changes encountered by wear-resistant coating alloys subjected to deformation under high frequency and high-intensity impact loading or accelerated wear condition. In the present study, the microstructural evolution of two commercial coating materials, FeCrB (Armacor M) and FeCrNiCoB (Armacor C), in the course of low- and high-intensity mechanical attrition, was monitored by X-ray diffraction and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. While low-intensity milling leads to marginal grain refinement but no change in phase-aggregate in FeCrB, similar mechanical attrition causes boride precipita…