Enhanced Tribological Properties of LA43M Magnesium Alloy by Ni60 Coating via Ultra-High-Speed Laser Cladding

Laser modification techniques have been widely adopted in the field of surface engineering. Among these modified techniques, ultra-high-speed laser cladding is trending most nowadays to fabricate wear-resistant surfaces. The main purpose of this research is to provide a detailed insight of ultra-high-speed laser cladding of hard Ni60 alloy on LA43M magnesium alloy to enhance its surface mechanical properties. Multiple processing parameters were investigated to obtain the optimal result. The synthesized coating was studied microstructurally by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) equipped with an energy dispersive spectrometer (EDS) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). The microhardness and wear resistance of the Ni60 coating were analyzed under Vickers hardness and pin on disc tribometer respectively. The obtained results show that the dense Ni60 coating was fabricated with a thickness of 300 μm. No cracks and porosities were detected in cross-sectional morphology. The Ni60 coating was mainly composed of γ-Ni and hard phases (chromium carbides and borides). The average microhardness of coating was recorded as 948 HV0.3, which is approximately eight times higher than that of the substrate. Meanwhile, the Ni60 coating exhibited better wear resistance than the substrate, which was validated upon the wear loss and wear mechanism. The wear loss recorded for the substrate was 6.5 times higher than that of the coating. The main wear mechanism in the Ni60 coating was adhesive while the substrate showed abrasive characteristics.