I have some private correspondence from ARMCO that shows there is considerable difference in the properties of liquid vs gas nitriding 17/4. This mainly in the wearing properties of the two processed material. It has also been our experience that we get much better service with liquid nitrided 17/4 vs Nitronic 60, both in the wear and galling properties , especially if we have occasional contact. We had several failures with gas nitrided 17/4 both from the nitriding process itself and the inservice application. Also we had another application using both liquid nitrided 303 SS and liquid nitrided 17/4 where we got excellent results. 303 SS doesn’t gas nitride very well.
I didn’t pursue the development of any processing specifications for gas nitriding 17/4 as the liquid process would satisfy all our requirements and at the time liquid nitriding was considerably cheaper with a much quicker turnaround for us.
As stated in previous posts I installed the first Nitronic 60 vs 17/4 (liquid nitrided) components in the late 60's and early 70's and all are still performing.