On the Prediction of Transient Wear

Abstract

During the runningin process, a friction pair experiences drastic evolution in many of its tribological parameters, such as surface roughness, wear rate, and coefficient of friction until steadystate is attained. In this paper, we present a model for predicting the behavior of the runningin process. Specifically, we determine a general relationship between the wear loss and surface roughness during the runningin stage and test the validity of its prediction of wear rate by comparing to available experimental results. We show, by using a dimensional analysis and applying the Buckingham Pi theorem, that there exists a linear relationship between the transient dimensionless wear, the dimensionless initial surface roughness, and dimensionless runningin time.