Patent ID: 7827902

Claim:
A piston for a reciprocating internal combustion engine, the piston comprising: a piston upper part made of a nitride-forming base alloy and having a plurality of peripheral piston ring grooves, each piston ring groove having two facing groove flanks, one of the piston ring grooves being closer to a combustion chamber of the internal combustion engine than the remaining piston ring grooves, the groove flanks of at least the one of the piston ring grooves being hardened groove flanks, each of the hardened groove flanks having a boundary layer, the piston upper part comprising an external surface which comprises the hardened groove flanks, and a wear and corrosion protection layer coating at least the external surface, the wear and corrosion protection layer comprising a nitration layer, wherein the nitration layer is generated by converting the nitride-forming base alloy by one of plasma nitration and plasma nitro-carburization in at least one of a nitrogen atmosphere and a nitrogen-carbon atmosphere, and wherein the nitration layer comprises a bonding layer having a thickness of 2 μm to 12 μm, the nitration layer and the boundary layer on the hardened groove flanks collectively having a nitration hardness depth of 0.2 mm to 1.0 mm, and exhibiting a surface hardness greater than 550 HV.