Effect of laser hardening on surface properties of high-speed steel

Abstract To improve the service life of high-speed steel tools, this paper studies the influence of laser treatment on the wear resistance, hardening layer depth, and hardness of high-speed steel tools. The results show that the influence of laser power, lap rate, and scanning speed on the hardness of high-speed steel tools is from large to small. Laser surface hardening can improve the hardness of high-speed steel tools, the hardness of high-speed steel tools after laser surface hardening is about 922 HV, the hardness of non-laser surface hardening is about 418 HV, and the hardness of laser surface hardening is about 0.5 times higher than that of non-laser surface hardening. After laser surface quenching, the wear resistance of high-speed steel tools has also been improved, the wear rate of laser quenching after 0.0023% is about 0.001% lower than that of non-laser quenching after 0.0033%, and the wear mechanism is mainly abrasive wear. After laser quenching, there are three areas on the surface of the high-speed steel tool: hardened layer, incomplete quenching zone, and matrix, and the carbon content of microstructure after laser quenching is increased.