Wear resistance of the driving wheels of orchard conveyor with coating strengthening

In response to address the issue of significant wear in the drive wheel groove within the rope wheel drive system of traction orchard transporters, resulting in traction slip failure, this study examines the wear resistance of the drive wheel in orchard transporters through the application of infiltration layer strengthening. Initially, the ANSYS software was utilized to investigate the relationship between the surface stress and strain of the drive wheel and its hardness. And the stress-strain law of the surface of the driving wheel rope slot was explored. The results showed that the maximum equivalent strain on the surface of the rope slot decreased with the increase of its hardness, which verifies the scientific basis of enhancing the wear resistance of the driving wheel by increasing the surface hardness of the rope slot. The thermal diffusion deposition (TD) technology was used to perform V and B coating strengthening treatment on the 45steel driving wheel. The structural characterization, mechanical properties, and friction and wear characteristics of the coating were compared and analyzed. Finally, the application performance of the strengthened driving wheel was tested using a transport machine simulation platform. The results showed that the thickness of the V and B layers is 20.9 and 97.3 μm respectively. Both are well bonded to the substrate, without obvious defects such as cracks or pores. Due to the formation of hard phases such as VC_x and Fe_xB in the coating, the hardness of the coating has been improved, with the hardness of the V and B coating reaching 22.08 and 13.45 GPa, respectively, which is 3-4 times higher than before treatment. Under dry friction, the surface friction coefficients of the V and B coating are 0.47 and 0.44, respectively, which are reduced by 19% and 24% compared to 45steel. And the average wear amount is reduced by 85% and 75% compared to 45steel, respectively. The friction and wear characteristics of the coating have been improved. The application performance test of the transport machine simulation bench showed that under dry friction, the average wear of the driving wheel after V and B coating treatment is reduced by 88% and 81% compared to 45steel respectively. Among them, the surface wear of the V coating driving wheel is the smallest, but the outer layer of the wire rope that matches it shows a phenomenon of wire breakage; Under oil lubrication friction, it decreased by 92% and 85% respectively compared to 45steel, and the wire rope showed no abnormalities. In summary, thermal diffusion V and B coating treatment can greatly improve the wear resistance of the driving wheel, in which the V coating has higher hardness and wear resistance, but in the application of real-time oil lubrication is required, more suitable for meeting the regular maintenance conditions of the drive wheel for strengthening. V and B coating’s wear resistance has been reduced, but can be used in dry friction, more suitable for the field and mountainous environments can not meet the lubrication of the drive wheel for strengthening. The results of this study can provide feasible technical solutions for improving the wear resistance of the driving wheels of the traction orchard conveyor.