The influence of heat treatment on the sliding wear behavior of a ZA-27 alloy

The effects of heat treatment, involving solutionizing at temperature of 370 °C for a relatively short period of time (3 or 5 h), followed by quenching in water, on tribological behavior of ZA-27 alloys were examined.Dry sliding wear tests were conducted on as-cast and heat-treated ZA-27 samples using block-on-disk machine over a wide range of applied loads. To determine the wear mechanisms, the worn surfaces of the samples were examined by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The tribological results were related to the microstructure and mechanical properties.The heat treatment resulted in reduction in the hardness and tensile strength but increase in elongation. The heat-treated alloy samples attained improved tribological behavior over the as-cast ones, both from the aspects of friction and wear. The improved tribological behavior of the heat-treated alloys, in spite of reduced hardness, could be the result of breaking the dendrite structure, when the fraction of interdendrite regions was considerably decreased and a very fine α and η mixture was formed at the same time. The wear response of the samples has been corroborated through characteristics of worn surfaces and dominant wear mechanisms.