Wear behaviour of doped WC-NI based hardmetals tested by four methods

Cemented tungsten carbide systems have been widely used in machine tools, ammunition rounds, and sporting equipment, as they possess the necessary combination of hardness and toughness to endure wear environments. In most applications, the abrasion phenomena has been identified as one of the sources of surface damage and material degradation. In this work, WC-Ni hardmetal is doped with zirconium carbide or titanium carbide to improve its abrasive and erosive wear resistance. TiC has been known to produce platelet grain structure meant for strengthening leading to enhanced abrasion resistance. ZrC can suppress grain coarsening and abnormal growth of WC grains while increasing hardness. Tribological characteristics are obtained from slurry and dry erosion, as well as high and low stress abrasion tests. The composite of WC-8Ni-TiC works best overall for various wear conditions with exception of high stress abrasion. WC-8Ni-ZrC does not provide any benefit of wear resistance in this study. Wear rate and mechanisms of wear were analysed by and discussed based on scanning electron microscopy studies.