Tribological Response of Heat Treated AISI 52100 Steels Against Steel and Ceramic Counterparts

AISI 52100 bearing steels are commonly used in applications requiring high hardness and abrasion resistance. The bearing steels are working under dynamic loads in service conditions and their toughness properties become important. In order to provide the desired mechanical properties, various heat treatments (austenizing, quenching and tempering) are usually applied. In this study, AISI 52100 bearing steel samples were austenized at 900°C for ½ h and water quenched to room temperature. Then tempering was carried out at 795°C, 400°C and 200°C for ½ h. In order to investigate the effect of heat treatment conditions on wear behavior, dry friction tests were performed according to ASTM G99-05 Standard with a ‘ball-on-disk’ type tribometer. The samples were tested against steel and ceramic counterparts using the parameters of 100 m distance and 30 N load and 0.063 m/s rotational speed. After wear test, the surface characterization was carried out using microscopy. Wear loss values were calculated using a novel optical method on both flat and counterpart specimens.