High-Temperature Oxidation Behavior of (Ti,Cr)N Coating Deposited on 4Cr13 Stainless Steel by Multi-arc Ion Plating

(Ti, Cr)N coatings were deposited on 4Cr13 stainless steel by multi-arc ion plating. High-temperature oxidation behaviors of (Ti1-xCrx)N (x=0.28, 0.56, 0.73) coatings with different chrome contents were investigated at 700 °C. And surface morphologies and surface compositions of oxidized coatings were also studied. Thermal analysis experiments of (Ti,Cr)N coatings were conducted by thermogravimetry (TG) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), and the results were compared with TiN coating. The results show that Cr content in the (Ti1-xCrx)N coating increases with the elevation of the arc current of Cr target, and a linear relation exists between Cr content and the ratio of arc current of Cr target and Ti target (ICr/ITi for short). The higher the Cr content is, the better the high-temperature oxidation resistance of (Ti1-xCrx)N coating is, and the oxidation thermodynamics temperatures of (Ti1-xCrx)N coating are higher than that of TiN coating, which indicates that the oxidation thermodynamic equilibrium temperature of the coating elevates observably with the addition of Cr.