The nuclear industry has used hard chromium plate for many years but is seeking alternatives, due to the adverse health effects of Cr(VI) employed in electroplating. In this study, testing and analysis regimes for the comparison of the sliding wear performance of candidate materials have been established and the performance of WC-(W,Cr)₂C-Ni has been compared with that of hard chromium plate.

WC-(W,Cr)₂C-Ni was applied to Inconel 625 substrates using a detonation gun thermal spray technique. Sliding wear testing was performed using a ball-on-flat configuration reciprocating tribometer at 20 °C in three environments: dry, deionised water and simulated nuclear reactor water chemistry. Wear rates have been evaluated, using both mass and volume loss, and the worn samples were analysed using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS).

The WC-(W,Cr)₂C-Ni coating had a broadly comparable wear performance to hard chromium plate in all three environments. There were differences between deionised and borated water, such that the latter needs to be used in further evaluation. SEM and XPS analyses enabled the wear mechanisms for WC-(W,Cr)₂C-Ni and HCP to be elucidated, including pull-out and tribolayer formation. XPS has shown that the tribolayer on WC-(W,Cr)₂C-Ni is stratified and undergoes chemical changes as a result of wear.