Yeungnam University

School of Mechanical Engineering

Syllabus for 0993 Tribology
Warm Welcome to Everybody

Chapter 1
Introduction to Tribology
History of tribology?
Figure 1: Drawing of two-wheeled harvest
cart with studded wheels. Luttrell Psalter
(folio 173v),circa 1338 AD.

Figure 2: The transportation of

Egyptians using lubricant to aid
movement of colossus(1880 BC)

Chapter 1
Introduction to Tribology
History of tribology?
Details of the history of tribology are given by: Dowson. Few notable
points are : September 1964 -- Conference on Lubrication in Iron and Steel Works
in Cardiff (UK). Realization of considerable losses due to lack of
knowledge related friction and wear of machine components.
After this realization UK Minister of State for science formed a
committee to investigate the education, research and the need of industry
related to lubrication.
Committee after deliberations concluded that only lubrication
engineering could not provide complete solution to deal with friction and
wear of machine components. An interdisciplinary approach embracing
solid and fluid mechanics, chemistry, and material science is essential.
Since there was no word for such new concept, a new name Tribology
was coined in 1966.

History of tribology?
The word tribology was first reported in a
landmark report by Jost (1966).
Tribology is derived from the Greek word Tribos.
Meaning of Tribos is Rubbing.

Prof. P. Jost
WTC,Sep. 2005

Deals with friction, wear and lubrication

Two aspects
Science: Basic mechanisms
Technology: Design, manufacture, maintenance
Tribological knowledge helps to improve service life, safety and
reliability of interacting machine components; and yields substantial
economic benefits.
After 1966, the word Tribology has been used for :
1. Basic mechanisms governing interfacial behavior.
2. Basic theories quantifying interfacial mechanisms.
3. Solutions to friction and wear problems.

Examples of Requiring Tribological

Knowledge :
Let us consider few failed machine components, failure of which could had
been avoided using tribological knowledge.
Example 1: Seal
Fig. 6: Carbon graphite seal.

Example 2: Cam
Fig. 7: Pitting of cam
surface.

Example 3: Journal Bearings

Fig. 8: (A) Abrasive wear and (B) Rubbing wear

Example 4: Magnetic Bearings

Fig. 9: Wear scare due to

edge loading

Example 5: Multi-Row Roller Bearings

Fig. 10: (A) Failure of large size roller bearing

Example 6: Gear

Fig. 11 (A): Gear teeth removed

from gear.

Fig. 12 (B): Pits on gear teeth.

Need of Tribology as subject:

Friction, wear and lubrication have been taught in many science and
engineering classes at a rudimentary level.
Most tribological phenomenon are inherently complicated and
interconnected, making it necessary to understand the concepts of
Tribology in details.
Integration of knowledge from multifaceted disciplines (solid
mechanics, fluid mechanics, material science, chemistry etc) is essential
and therefore a seprate subject is required.
Solid Mechanics: Focus is on expressions of contact
stresses/deformations and surface temperatures due to rolling/sliding.

Fig. 13: Solid mechanics

Need of Tribology as subject:

Fluid Mechanics: Study of lubricant film
formed between various geometric shapes
of rolling/sliding surfaces.
Fig. 14: Fluid mechanics

Material Science: Focus is on atomic and

micro scales mechanisms whereby solid
surface degradation or alteration occurs
during relative motion.
Chemistry: Deals with reactivity between
lubricants and solid surfaces.

Fig. 15: Material science and chemistry

Thermodynamics: Heat and mass transfer in fluids and bounding solids.

Economic Benefit:
Implementation of tribological knowledge provide economic benefits by
reducing energy loss due to friction, loss due to breakdowns, reducing
depreciation of machinery. Jost Report(1966) indicates saving of about
515M/year by implementing tribology in UK industry.

Economic Benefit:

It impacts national economy of all nations and lifestyles of

most people

New materials and coatings Can

lower friction and reduce wear, and
thus can have a positive impact on
future tribological systems

Example 1 : Hard Disk Drive

Inside a disk drive, a slider with read/write recording head
flies over a rotating disk as shown in Fig. 16 and Fig. 17.
Reduction in spacing between head sensor & magnetic
medium by implementing tribological guidelines, increases
the areal density and larger data can be stored in relatively
smaller space.

Fig. 16: Hard disk drive (side view)

Fig. 17: Hard disk drive (top view)

Reference:Sgu D.Z., Khan P.V. and Hwang P.; A a Study of Head-Disk Interaction
Detection in the Hard-Disk Drives. Surface Review and Letters, Vol. 22
(2015)

Example 2: I.C.Engine
Approximately 15% energy is lost through friction due to motion of
pistons (Fig. 18) valve trains (Fig. 19 and Fig. 20), bearings (Fig.
21) etc. 10% is lost through friction in the gearboxes and wheel
bearings.

Fig.18: Reciprocating piston

Fig.19: Valve train

Fig.20: Direct overhead cam

There are more than 700 million vehicles in world. Average power of
engine is estimated as 30 BHP and with tribological knowledge this can
be increased by 2 to 5%. If we assume 2% improvement in BHP, then 420
million HP can be saved.

Example 2: Bearings
Average Iron and Steel industry allots Rs. 3-5 million for maintenance /
Replacement of bearings.
A rough estimation indicates that 10% percent of bearing life can be
improved by better lubricant, lubricant additive, proper bearing
installation.
Implementation of tribological knowledge in iron and steel industries of
India can save 3 to 5 million rupees per year.

Fig. 21: Failure of outer ring of bearing

Four Elements of Tribology

I.

Surface interactions with its environment,

including lubrication and lubricants

II. Generation and transmission of forces at the

interface
III. Response of materials to the force generated at
the interface
IV. Design of tribological systems

Fig. 22: Practical objectives of tribology.

Introduction: Interdisciplinary Approach

Roll of Surface Roughness:

Fig. 23: The bathcurve hypotetical failure rate versus time.

To minimize the effect of surface roughness a soft coating (equivalent to a

carpet as shown in 15) on the surface is preferred due to its easy elastic
deformation.

Fig. 24: Using elasticity to smooth the ride.

Introduction: Interdisciplinary Approach

Roll of Elastic Deformation:
As two surfaces are brought together surface roughness causes contact to occur at
discrete contact spots. Elastic and plastic deformations occur in the region of contact
spots, establishing stresses which oppose the applied load.
Due to positive deviations (roughness above the nominal surface), the contact
between solids confines to a very small fraction of nominally area(A), and as a
result estimated contact stresses stress on rough surface = F/A) are much higher in
magnitude compared to nominal stresses as expressed by following equation :
Stress on smooth surface = F/A Eq.(1.1)

Fig. 25: Two undesirable surfaces

Surface Roughness :
Surface roughness is defined by short
wavelength vertical deviations from
nominal surface. Larger the deviations,
rougher the surface.
Fig. 26: Standard method of estimate roughness

Fig. 27: Two common triboe surfaces

Fig 27. shows too tribo-surfaces. If we

compare Ra and Rq values of two images as
shown in 1.14(a) and 1.14(b) respectively,
we find better performance of 1.14(a)
compared 1.14(b). In other words rough
surfaces usually wear more quickly and
have higher friction coefficients than
smoother surface.

Quantification of Surface Roughness:

As explained in previous sub-heading surface roughness is quantified by R a and Rq
values which can be calculated by discretizing surfaces as shown in Fig. 28 in
number of points.

Fig. 28: Discretization of surface to find Ra and Rq

Average roughness(Ra)
where Z = Variation of surface from mean line
N = Total number of points in sampling length (L).
Root mean square roughness(Rq)

Fig. 29: Comparing Rq and Ra

There is possibility to reduce contact stresses induced at asperities by lubricating

the surfaces. But based on the level of lubricating film thickness relative to heights
of asperities, the governing mechanism will change. To quantity lubrication
mechanism a dimensionless film parameter (Specific film thickness) () which is
the ratio of separation between two surfaces and the rms surface roughness values
of surface is defined by following equation:

Based on specific film thickness (), lubrication regime can be identified.

If < 1 then more number of asperities contact will occur and there is a
more possibility of wear.
If > 5 there is hardly any possibility of asperities contact and there
would not be any wear.
If is between 3 to 5 fluid pressure between tribo surfaces would be
significant to cause elastic deformation of asperities

Fig. 30: Wear rate comparison among

lubricating mechanics

Fig. 31: Stribeck curve (comparison of

friction coefficient

Fig. 31: Hydrodynamic to mixed lubrication

Fig. 32: Indicates hydrodynamic lubrication regime may become mixed

lubrication regime in the presence of large size debris. To avoid this lubricant
filter systems are used.

Fundamentals of Contact between Solids

Surfaces of solids represent a very complex form of matter, for more
complicated than a mere plane. There is a variety of defect and distortions
present on any real surface.
These surface features ranging from bulk distortion of the surface to local
microscopic irregularities, exert a strong influence on friction and wear.

Surface Topography :

Almost every known surface, apart from the cleaved faces of mica are rough.
Roughness means that most parts of a surface are not flat but either a peak or a
valley.
The typical amplitude between the peaks and valleys for engineering surfaces
is about 1 micrometer.
In micro or macro scale, roughness always exists. Even at extreme scale such
as surface of a planet, the roughness has the same features at micro or macro
scale, what are the observable features of surface roughness?

Another unique properties of surface roughness is that, if repeatedly magnified,

increased, increasing details of surface features are observed down to the
nanoscale.
Also the appearance of the surface profiles is the same regardless of the
magnification.
Surface roughens has multi-scale features. A rough surface contains a smaller
scale of roughens at high magnification. Ex. Surface of the earth is rough, as
well as that of a mountain, a hill, a rock, etc.

Characterization of roughness is difficult. One methods apples statistics by

distribution of height of peaks, or by their accumulative frequency.

A normal distribution (Gaussian) will show a straight line of cumulative graph

using log scale.

Height characteristics:

Roughness can be reports as Ra, Rq, or others. They are average value of peak height
distribution. Different roughness values use different way to average the peak height.

Sensitivity of different kinds of roughness value are different. Each kind of

roughness value has different sensitivity to different surface feature. In the
example above, Ra is not so sensitivity to the peak high, but rather to the
volume of the material above datum. But Rq shows large difference of values
for the two kinds of surface.

Spatial characteristics:

Spatial distribution of peaks can be characterized by graph of R() and ).

Or can be seen from the values of *, which show the rate of change of slope of the
normalized R() graph.

Contact between Solids

Real contact area is the summation of contact area of each asperities.

Nominal contact area is the macro scale contact area. This includes real contact
area, and any void and non-contacting regions between the rough surfaces.

At asperities, actual stress at contact point is much larger than the average stress
(nominal contact pressure) calculated by load divided by nominal contact area.

Real area of contact:

Model of Contact between Solids based on Statistical parameters of

Rough Surfaces

There have been studies of real contact area. The values of real contact area is difficult to be
estimated. However, by converging roughness level, a approximation can be done b/n
relationship b/n real contact area and applied load. It was found that as the level of roughness
increases, A varies with W.

There are several models for calculation of real contact area, for example,
Onions and Archard model:

Mean pressure does not depends on the apparent area contact. For a rough
surface, there is a specific proportionality between load and real contact area.

As load increase, plastic deformation becomes the dominating kind of deformation. Real
contact area value approached apparent contact area value, as deep grooves and depression
become intact. Level of plastic deformation of contacting surface can be estimated by
three modes.

Larger degree of plastic deformation, wear of contacting surface is likely. This is because
plastic deformation causes permanent damage to the asperities.

Effect of Sliding on Contact between Solid Surfaces:

During sliding due to an applied tangential force, asperities dig deeper as the
surface which resists the force is reduced to one side only. Ramping effect will
eventually lift the asperities up, slight increases separation between the two
surfaces.

The high asperities have larger effect to wear of surface, compared to the lower ones.
Some low asperities loose contact with the surface during lifting off.

Wear debris generated by plastic deformation can be trapped in grooves or depression

between asperities. This in effect reduced the actual contact real of the two surfaces.
Lumps of wear debris eventually replace asperities as the site of true contact.

Contact Theories
Heinrich Hertz (1882) described localized deformation and distribution of
pressure between to elastic bodies with certain BCs

S, e satisfy DEQ of equilibrium and s vanish far from contact

Contact is frictionless
Pressure is equal and opposite
Integral of pressure distribution is contact force

Found that an ellipsoidal distribution of pressure would satisfy BCs for two
spheres in contact.
Joseph Boussinesq (1885) described a solution for point contact on a
surface.
Allows solution for any distribution of pressure with a contact area by the
principle of superposition, e.g. cylindrical flat punch

Hertzian contact
When an elastic sphere is pressed against an elastic
material, the contact area increases.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hertz_contact_animated.gif

Classic Hertz Solutions

Contact between a sphere and an elastic half-space
a Rd
The applied force F is related to the displacement d by

4 * 1/2 3/2
ER d
3
1 1 12 1 22

E*
E1
E2

where

Contact between two spheres

r 2
p (r ) p0 1 2
a

where p0 is the maximum contact pressure given by

3F
1 6 FE *2
p0

2 a 2 R 2
where
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contact_mechanics

1 1
1

R R1 R2

1/3

3FR
a
4E*
3

a2
d
R

Boussinesq Solution
A rigid cylinder is pressed into an elastic half-space

r 2
p r p0 1 2
a

where

a is the radius of the cylinder and

p0

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contact_mechanics

1/2

Ed
a

The relationship between indentation depth

and normal force is

F 2aEd