In this work an effort has been made to study the effect on the performance of the plasma nitrided AISI H13 hot-forging dies and punches in two different forging service conditions –namely, fully-automatic and semi-automatic processes. The plasma nitriding is performed to increase the surface properties like –wear resistance and surface hardness of these components. After plasma nitriding the surface hardness of these materials has increased typically from ~500 HV 0.01 to ~1200 HV 0.01 . In the plasma nitriding process high-voltage electrical energy is used to form plasma through which nitrogen ions are accelerated to impinge on the workpiece. The ion bombardment heats the workpiece, cleans the surface, and provides active nitrogen to make iron-nitride compounds. The iron-nitride compounds then diffuse to the workspace to harden the surface. In these two service conditions the plasma nitrided hot-forging dies and punches have shown typically 2.5 to 4 times increment during the performance. It is observed that the increment in the performance of the dies and punches depends on the forging service conditions, i.e., temperature of the dies and punches, shot repetition time and effective cooling of dies and punches in service conditions. Four times increment in the performance of dies and punches is found in the semi-automatic process, whereas two and half times increment in performance of dies and punches is observed in the fully-automatic process.
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