With the development of 3D printing technology, there is a need to produce printable materials with improved properties, e.g., sliding properties. In this paper, the authors present the possibilities of producing composites based on biodegradable PLA with the addition of graphite. The team created composites with the following graphite weight contents: 1%, 2.5%, 5%, 7.5%, and 10%. Neat material was also subjected to testing. Tribological, mechanical, and chemical properties of the mentioned materials were examined. Measurements were also made after keeping the samples in ageing and climatic ovens. Furthermore, SEM observations of samples before and after friction tests were carried out. It was demonstrated that increasing graphite content caused a significant decrease in wear (PLA + 10% graphite had a wear rate three times lower than for a neat material). The addition of graphite did not adversely affect most of the other properties, but it ought to be noted that mechanical properties changed significantly. After conditioning in a climatic oven PLA + 10% graphite has (in comparison with neat material) 11% lower fracture stress, 47% lower impact strength, and 21% higher Young’s modulus. It can be certainly stated that the addition of graphite to PLA is a step towards obtaining a material that is low-cost and suitable for printing sliding spare parts.

Coatings based on titanium carbonitride alloyed with zirconium and chromium were deposited using the method of reactive magnetron sputtering on the surface of titanium VT1–0. The effect of alloying titanium carbonitride with zirconium and chromium on the tribo- and corrosion properties of the coating has been studied. Coatings with different compositions were formed by changing the ratio of alloying elements to titanium in a single target. To study the obtained coatings, a scanning electron microscopy, nanoindentation, sliding wear test (ball on disk method), and corrosion tests in 0.5 M Na₂SO₄ and 30% NaCl solution were used. As a result of wear and corrosion tests, friction coefficients, mass index, and corrosion rate of alloyed and pure titanium carbonitride coatings were obtained. The average coefficient of friction of the coatings varied in the range of 0.17–0.31. The values of nanohardness are determined depending on the composition of the coatings. From corrosion data, it is determined that TiCrCN and TiZrCN coatings exhibit better corrosion properties compared to TiCN coatings. As a result of the dependences obtained, the preferred composition of the coating, the most resistant to wear and corrosion damage, was revealed.

The present study shows promising approach to produce hydrogen-accumulated rechargeable intermetallic compounds (IMC) from three-component powder composition Ti-25Al- 25Nb (at%), through experimentally chosen best modes and combined technological processes. The study includes research results on the effect of mechanoactivation (MA) process and following spark plasma sintering (SPS) technique on structural phase state of intermetallic Ti-Al-Nb composites. It was revealed that upon activation of the initial powder mixtures during their machining, intermetallic phases are formed by the interpenetration of aluminum into titanium and niobium lattices with the formation of solid solutions (Ti, Al) and (Nb, Al). It is found out, that the combination of MA and SPS is good for producing fine-graded predicted micro-structures in Ti-Al-Nb system owing to the activation of particle surface and formation of intermetallic phases at the preparation stage of powder mixture using MA technique as well as due to the effect of fast consolidation using SPS. This points to the fact of prospect for creating metal hydrides by combining MA and SPS techniques that makes it possible to obtain fine-grained IMC containing fair amount of O-phase.

In the present work, the titanium carbonitride coatings were deposited by the reactive magnetron sputtering method at different substrate bias: 0, −70 V, and −100 V. The effect of the substrate bias on the structure, composition, and mechanical and tribological properties of titanium carbonitride coatings was studied. Scanning electron microscopy, nanoindentation, sliding wear test (ball-on-disk method), X-ray phase, and elemental analysis methods were used to evaluate the tribological properties and microstructure of the thin coatings. The dependencies obtained resulted in the determination of the most preferred mode of deposition by magnetron sputtering at a negative substrate bias in an atmosphere of argon–acetylene–nitrogen.