High temperature plasma immersion ion implantation of Ti6Al4V

We have performed high temperature nitrogen plasma immersion ion implantation (PIII) of Ti6Al4V by heating the samples for up to 800 °C, using tungsten filaments inside the sample holder. Ion implantation was done with the high voltage pulser at 5 kV, 40 μs duration and 400 Hz frequency, and a nitrogen glow discharge as the plasma source. Nanoindentation analysis of the treated surface indicated an improvement of 5 times in hardness for PIII treatment of 120 min. X-ray diffraction indicated the formation of Ti2N. Auger Electron Spectroscopy (AES) showed that the peak concentration is greater than 30% in the implanted nitrogen with the maximum penetration of 150 nm for the sample treated during 120 min.