Engineering Tribology

Wear

Prof. Dr. Tamer S. Mahmoud

Wear
Wear
Wear
Types of Wear
 Abrasive wear.
 Adhesive wear.
 Erosive wear.
 Cavitation wear.
 Fatigue wear.
 Corrosive wear.
 Oxidative wear.
 Fretting wear.
Abrasive Wear
 Abrasive wear occurs whenever a solid object is loaded against
particles of a material that have equal or greater hardness.
 Any material, even if the bulk of it is very soft, may cause
abrasive wear if hard particles are present.
Abrasive Wear
Abrasive Wear Mechanism

Mechanisms of abrasive wear: microcutting, fracture, fatigue and grain pull-out.

Abrasive Wear Modes
 The way the grits pass over the worn surface determines
the nature of abrasive wear.
 The literature denotes two basic modes of abrasive wear:
 two-body and
 three-body abrasive wear.
Abrasive Wear Modes
 Two-body abrasive wear is exemplified by the action of sandpaper
on a surface.
 Hard asperities or rigidly held grits pass over the surface like a
cutting tool.
Abrasive Wear Modes
 In three-body abrasive wear the grits are free to roll as well as
slide over the surface, since they are not held rigidly.

Three-body mode of abrasive wear.

Analytical Model of Abrasive Wear
 In one of the simplest and oldest models of abrasive wear a
rigidly held grit is modelled by a cone indenting a surface and
being traversed along the surface.
 In this model it is assumed that all the material displaced by the
cone is lost as wear debris.

Model of abrasive wear by a single grit.

Analytical Model of Abrasive Wear
 In this model of abrasive wear the individual load on the grit is
the product of the projected area of the indentation by the cone
and the material's yield stress under indentation (hardness):
Analytical Model of Abrasive Wear
 The approximate volume of the material removed by the cone is
the product of the cross-sectional area of the indentation 'd2cotα'
and the traversed distance ‘l’, i.e.:
Analytical Model of Abrasive Wear
 Substituting for 'd' from the two equations into
results in an expression for the worn volume of
material in terms of the load on the grit, the
shape of the grit, and the sliding distance, i.e.“:

 The total wear is the sum of the individual grit

worn volumes of the material:
Analytical Model of Abrasive Wear
Abrasive Wear Resistance of Materials

Relative abrasive
wear resistance
versus undeformed
hardness for pure
metals and alloys
Erosive Wear
 Erosive wear is caused by the impact
of particles of solid or liquid against
the surface of an object.
 Erosive wear occurs in a wide variety
of machinery and typical examples are
the damage to gas turbine blades when
an aircraft flies through dust clouds and
the wear of pump impellers in mineral
slurry processing systems.
Mechanisms of Erosive Wear

Possible mechanisms of erosion; a) abrasion at low impact

angles, b) surface fatigue during low speed, high impingement
angle impact,
Mechanisms of Erosive Wear

c) brittle fracture or multiple plastic deformation during medium speed,

large impingement angle impact, d) surface melting at high impact speeds, e)
macroscopic erosion with secondary effects,
Mechanisms of Erosive Wear

Impingement angle of a particle causing erosion of surface.

Effect of Impingement Angle on Erosive Wear Rate
 Impingement angles can range from 0 oC to 90 oC.
 At zero impingement angle there is negligible wear
because the eroding particles do not impact the surface,
although even at relatively small impingement angles of
about 20 oC , severe wear may occur if the particles are
hard and the surface is soft.
Effect of Impingement Angle on Erosive Wear Rate
 If the surface is brittle then severe wear by fragmentation of the surface may
occur, reaching its maximum rate at impact angles close to 90 oC.

Schematic representation of the effect of impingement angle on wear rates of

ductile and brittle materials.
Effect of Impact speed on Erosive Wear Rate
 The impact speed of the particle has a very strong effect
on wear rate.
 There is often a threshold velocity below which wear is
negligibly small.
 For medium to high speeds covering most practical
problems, the relationship between wear rate and impact
velocity can be described by a power law, i.e.:
Effect of Impact Speed on Erosive Wear Rate

 The value of the exponent 'n' is usually in the range between 2 and
3 for solid particles which is slightly in excess of any prediction
based on the kinetic energy of the particles.
Cavitation Wear
 Cavitation wear is known to damage equipment such as
propellers or turbine blades operating in wet steam, and valve
seats.
 Wear progresses by the formation of a series of holes or pits in
the surface exposed to cavitation.
 The entire machine component can be destroyed by this process.
Operation of equipment, e.g., propellers, is often limited by severe
vibration caused by cavitation damage.
Cavitation Wear
Cavitation Wear
Mechanism of Cavitation Wear
 The characteristic feature of cavitation is the cyclic
formation and collapse of bubbles on a solid surface in
contact with a fluid.
 Bubble formation is caused by the release of dissolved gas
from the liquid where it sustains a near-zero or negative
pressure.
 Negative pressures are likely to occur when flow of liquid
enters a diverging geometry, i.e., emerging from a small
diameter pipe to a large diameter pipe.
Mechanism of Cavitation Wear
 The down-stream face of a sharp sided object moving in
liquids, e.g., ship propeller, is particularly prone to
cavitation.
 The ideal method of preventing cavitation is to avoid
negative pressures close to surfaces, but in practice this is
usually impossible.
Mechanism of Cavitation Wear

Mechanism of cavitation wear: a) mechanism of bubble collapse and b)

experimental evidence of damage by cavitation to a metallic (indium) surface
Adhesive Wear
 Adhesive wear is a very serious form of wear
characterized by high wear rates and a large unstable
friction coefficient.
 Sliding contacts can rapidly be destroyed by adhesive wear
and, in extreme cases, sliding motion may be prevented
by very large coefficients of friction or seizure.
 Metals are particularly prone to adhesive wear hence its
practical significance.
Adhesive Wear Mechanism
 Most solids will adhere on contact with another solid to
some extent provided certain conditions are satisfied.
 Adhesion between two objects casually placed together is
not observed because intervening contaminant layers of
oxygen, water and oil are generally present.
 Adhesion is also reduced with increasing surface
roughness or hardness of the contacting bodies.
Adhesive Wear Mechanism
Adhesive Wear Mechanism

Process of metal transfer due to adhesion

Control of Adhesive Wear
 Contaminant Layers Formed Due to Surface Oxidation and Bulk
Impurities.
 Oxidation of metal surfaces can lower adhesion to acceptable levels.
 Lubricants
 The primary purpose of a lubricant is to suppress adhesive wear by providing a
superior form of surface 'contamination'.
 Favourable Combinations of Sliding Materials
 A careful choice of materials can yield benefits of minimized wear and friction. An
example of this is the combination of steel and bronze used for the shaft and
bush in journal bearings The general rule is to avoid sliding similar or identical
materials against each other.
Fatigue Wear
 In many well-lubricated contacts, adhesion between the two
surfaces is negligible, yet there is still a significant rate of
wear.
 Contacts between asperities accompanied by very high local
stresses are repeated a large number of times in the course
of sliding or rolling, and wear particles are generated by
fatigue propagated cracks, hence the term 'fatigue wear'.
 Wear under these conditions is determined by the
mechanics of crack initiation, crack growth and fracture.
Fatigue Wear

Schematic illustration of the process of surface crack initiation and

propagation.
Fatigue Wear

Schematic illustration of mechanism of wear particles formation due to

growth of surface initiated cracks
Fatigue Wear

Example of fatigue wear particle formation on cast iron.

Review Questions
Assignment (4)
Review Questions
1. What is the difference between two-body and three-
body abrasive wear and why is this difference important?
2. Does heat treatment of metallic alloys to gain increases
in hardness offer large improvements in wear resistance
to a hard abrasive?
3. What coating properties are needed in order to resist
abrasive wear?
4. What is the main difference between abrasive and erosive
wear?
Review Questions
5. What is the effect of Impingement Angle on Erosive Wear
Rate?
6. Give an example where erosive wear by solids and liquids is
used in engineering to our advantage.
7. Is cavitation wear an entirely destructive process?
8. State the mechanisms of Abrasive wear?
9. What is the cause of adhesive wear?
10. What is the cause of adhesive film transfer between
two contacting bodies of dissimilar mechanical strengths?
Review Questions
11. Give an example of a beneficial effect of adhesive wear.
12. In dry sliding of metallic alloys what steps can be
undertaken to minimize adhesive wear?
13. Under what conditions does fatigue wear occur?
14. Explain briefly how a wear particle is formed by fatigue wear.