Analysis of Nitrogen Ion Implantation on Corrosion Inhabitation of Zirconium Nitride Coated 304 Stainless Steel and Correlation with Nano-strucrure and Surface Hardness

One of the common methods to improve and change the structural, wear, and corrosion characteristics of materials is to create a resistant thin film using the physical vapor deposition process. Various ions are substituted or interspersed on the surface of metal or non-metal parts using accelerators. This article investigates the structural, corrosion, and mechanical properties (hardness) of zirconium nitride coatings prepared by ion beam sputtering and nitrogen ion implantation on 304 stainless steel. For this purpose, a coating of zirconium with a thickness of 100 nm has been deposited on 304 stainless steel by the ion beam sputtering method. Nitrogen ion implantation was performed at a temperature of 400 K and a dose of 5×10^17 N+ cm−2 at energies of 10, 20, 40, and 80 keV. The crystallographic investigation, hardness, corrosion tests in 0.6 M NaCl solution, and SEM were done for different samples. The correlation between the test results, considering the increase in the implantation energy, introduced the optimal energy of 40 keV to make the sample with the highest degree of corrosion resistance and hardness.