Cathodic Cage Plasma Nitriding: An Innovative Technique

Cylindrical samples of AISI 1020, AISI 316, and AISI 420 steels, with different heights, were simultaneously treated by a new technique of ionic nitriding, entitled cathodic cage plasma nitriding (CCPN), in order to evaluate the efficiency of this technique to produce nitrided layers with better properties compared with those obtained using conventional ionic nitriding technique. This method is able to eliminate the edge effect in the samples, promoting a better uniformity of temperature, and consequently, a smaller variation of the thickness/height relation can be obtained. The compound layers were characterized by X-ray diffraction, optical microscopy, and microhardness test profile. The results were compared with the properties of samples obtained with the conventional nitriding, for the three steel types. It was verified that samples treated by CCPN process presented, at the same temperature, a better uniformity in the thickness and absence of the edge effect.