Vol.:(0123456789) 1 3 Journal of Bio- and Tribo-Corrosion (2021) 7:7 https://doi.org/10.1007/s40735-020-00437-9 Efect of Ball Burnishing on Surface Roughness and Wear of AISI 316L SS Selma Attabi 1  · Abdelaziz Himour 1  · Lakhdar Laouar 2  · Amir Motallebzadeh 3 Received: 24 March 2020 / Revised: 21 September 2020 / Accepted: 14 October 2020 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 Abstract This work aims at the improvement of surface quality and wear resistance of AISI 316L stainless steel, used in diferent industrial sectors including orthopedic applications. Ball-burnishing treatment, considered as a very efcient mechanical fnish process, was applied with respect to the response surface method. Surface roughness parameter Ra was minimized by using a mathematical model based on Box–Behnken model and expressing Ra as a function of applied charge, feed rate, and ball diameter. After optimization, the selected regime was fxed and the number of passes was increased by up to 5. Ra was measured again and tribological behavior was studied. Results show that surface roughness of best burnished sample can be decreased to a value much less by 93.4% and correspondingly, its wear loss can be improved by 53.4%, but with respect to fx 3 passes during ball burnishing. Morphologies of wear scars analyzed by scanning electron microscopy specify that adhesive wear occurred in both untreated and burnished surfaces. The coefcient of friction, measured under dry conditions, was reduced only for the smoothest surface, while other specimens had elevated coefcient of friction compared to turned surface. Keywords Ball burnishing · Surface roughness · Wear · 316L SS · Box–Behnken design Abbreviations BB Ball burnishing COF Coefcient of friction D Ball diameter [mm] f Burnishing feed rate[mm/rev] f t Turning feed rate [mm/rev] i Number of burnishing passes N Rotational frequency [rev/min] p Depth of pass [mm] P x Burnishing force [N] Ra Arithmetical surface roughness average [μm] RSM Response surface method SS Stainless steel 1 Introduction AISI 316L stainless steel is widely used in several industrial sectors, notably chemical, maritime, and military. Thanks to its excellent toughness and high properties of biocompat- ibility, mechanical strength, and corrosion resistance, it is also highly recommended in orthopedic applications for the manufacture of implants such as knees, artifcial hip joints, and total hip prosthesis [1]. Considering the daily move- ments rhythm of skeletal human body parts, these implants are permanently subjected to friction mechanisms. However, this alloy displays a low wear resistance which restricts often its uses [2]. Regarding the high sensibility of surgical sec- tor, this issue needs to be studied very carefully to extend lifetime of implants, and also to avoid any harmful efect, related to their service failure [3, 4].To overcome the men- tioned problem, the surface treatment methods have been applied as practical techniques for improving tribological properties by eliminating superfcial defects and thus pre- venting wear from spreading out to the bulk material [5, 6]. Among these techniques, ball polishing (BB), which * Selma Attabi attabi.selma@gmail.com * Abdelaziz Himour ahimour@yahoo.fr 1 Laboratory of Surface Engineering LIS, Department of Chemistry, University of Badji Mokhtar, PO Box 12, 23000 Annaba, Algeria 2 Laboratory of Industrial Mechanics (LMI), Badji Mokhtar— University of Annaba, PO Box 12, 23000 Annaba, Algeria 3 Koç University Surface Science and Technology Center (KUYTAM), Rumelifeneri Yolu 34450, Sariyer, Istanbul, Turkey