Oxidation and carburisation steel in gun barrels

In this report a theoretical and experimental study of some basic gun barrel erosion mechanisms have been carried out. The theoretical analysis of the reaction mechanisms leading to erosion is based on the minimalization of Gibbs free energy. Oxygen, carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and argon are used in a thermo gravimetric (TGA) experimental study. Based on the TGA experiments and on hardness measurements of the heat affected specimens, we suggest an explanation for the heat affected zone for the lands in a gun barrel. In general we find that the erosion mechanisms are quite complex, but we believe that some basic insight into the more general problem of gun barrel erosion has been achieved through the theoretical and experimental study in this report.