Abstract:

This paper presents a method of selection of an optimal (the best possible) thermochemical treatment of a steel guide of yarn for a ring spinning frame with the use of an optimisation procedure based on assumed criteria, and with consideration of their importance. Yarn guides for a ring spinning frame were manufactured from three brands of steel and were subjected to the following types of thermochemical treatment: 50SiCr4 steel (chrome hardening, diffusion boronising, and titanising); 41CrAlMo7 steel (nitrosulfiding and nitrogen case hardening), and C45 steel (diffusion boronizing). Unit manufacturing costs and six criteria of manufacturing quality: four parameters of surface texture (Rq, Rp, RΔq, r_w), maximal hardness of the surface layer (HV_0,1), and the case depth of the surface layer (g_ww), were taken as criteria for assessment. Values of the assessment criteria obtained from calculations and measurements were subjected to normalisation. The knowledge of experts and importance matrix B evaluated with the use of the Saaty method (consisting in pairwise comparison of the successive criteria) were used to determine the importance of the criteria taken for the assessment. Using the Power method, eigenvalues of matrix B were found, as well as corresponding coordinates y_t  of the eigenvector, which are simultaneously the weights of the corresponding criteria. Normalised decisions were created in the next step by raising each component of the normalised assessments to a power equal to the corresponding weight. In the last step of the procedure, a single optimal lining-up was created comprising the smallest s-th components of the individual decisions d₁, d₂, …, d_m. The best variant of the thermochemical treatment was recognised as corresponding to the largest component of the optimal lining-up, which in our case is the diffusion boronizing.