Tribological behaviour of nitrogen implanted into zirconium and titanium.

This paper gathers the studies of the effects introduced by Nitrogen implantation on Ti and Zr. Atomic and molecular Nitrogen have been implanted on Titanium and Zirconium samples to investigate the role of these elements in the nitrides precipitation. In all cases an increase in microhardness, which in some cases was greater than 80% was found out. Moreover was observed improvements in the wear resistance and a decrease in the friction coefficient. AES and XPS spectroscopy revealed that nitride precipitation in titanium is more significant for the high atomic doses of Nitrogen implantation.