Thermal stability and oxidation resistance of sputtered Ti Al Cr N hard coatings

In recent years, TiAlCrN coatings attract broad research interests owing to their excellent mechanical and tribological properties. Here, we study the thermal stability and oxidation resistance of two Ti1 − x − yAlxCryN coating series, having up to 47 at.% Cr (of the metal fraction, hence, y ≤ 0.47) for Al/(Ti + Al) ratios of ~ 0.55 and ~ 0.65. All as-deposited Cr-containing coatings are single-phase face-centered cubic (c) structured with...