Abstract
Ferritic plasma nitrocarburising was performed on pure iron using a modified DC plasma unit. This investigation was carried out with various gas compositions which consisted of nitrogen, hydrogen and carbon monoxide gases, and various gas pressures for 3 hours at $570^{\circ}C$. After treatment, the different cooling rates(slow cooling and fast cooling) were used to investigate its effect on the structure of the compound layer. The ${\varepsilon}$ phase occupied the outer part of the compound layer and ${\gamma}^{\prime}$ phase existed between the ${\varepsilon}$ phase and the diffusion zone. The gas composition of the atmosphere influenced the constitution of the compound layer produced, i.e. high nitrogen contents were essential for the production of ${\varepsilon}$ phase compound layer. It was found that with increasing carbon content in the gas mixture the compound layer thickness increased up to 10%. In the gas pressure around 3 mbar, the compound layer characteristics were slightly effected by gas pressure. However, in the low gas pressure and high gas pressure, the compound layer characteristics were significantly changed. The constitution of the compound layer was altered by varying the cooling rate. A large amount of ${\gamma}^{\prime}$ phase was transformed from the ${\varepsilon}$ phase during slow cooling.