Tribological behaviour of ZrCN PVD and other DLC coatings for engine components

Plasma Assisted Chemical Vapour Deposition (PACVD) and Physical Vapour Deposition (PVD) coatings are used in many fields of Tribology and, in particular, as coatings for engine components in automotive applications for enhancing wear resistance and achieving friction reduction [1]. Recently, the effect of the tribo-reactive materials in combination with bio-lubricants for engine components was published by A. Igartua et al. [2]. In this work different types of commercial available Diamond Like Carbon (DLC) coatings are compared with the new proposal multilayer ZrCN coating deposited by PVD and developed by IK4-TEKNIKER, presenting the experimental/analytical approach for coating pre-selection before engine tests in actual working conditions.