Texturization of engine components with shaped ultrashort laser pulses

Abstract

The aim of this work was to texturize surfaces of steel engine components to reduce the coefficient of dynamic friction and wear between two surfaces. The elements of the texture had the shape of a spherical half-shell and were produced by the overlap of femtosecond laser pulses with donut shape. The incubation effect was estimated using the D-scan method to relate the ablation threshold to the number of overlapping pulses. Thus, the control of the focal position of the laser beam and the number of overlapped pulses, taking into account the effects of incubation, made it possible to obtain this type of dimple with controlled shape and size. A distribution of dimples with density of 11% caused an 18% reduction in the coefficient of friction in a tribological pair DIN 16MnCr5 and SAE 52100 steel sphere.