Andrey Ovcharenko

Experimental Study of Adhesive Static Friction in a Spherical Elastic-Plastic Contact

The elastic-plastic contact between a deformable sphere and a rigid flat during presliding is studied experimentally. Measurements of friction force and contact area are done in real time along with an accurate identification of the instant of sliding inception. The static friction force and relative tangential displacement are investigated over a wide range of normal preloads for several sphere materials and diameters. Different behavior of the static friction is observed in the elastic and in the elastic-plastic regimes of sphere deformation. It is found that at low normal loads, the static friction coefficient depends on the normal load in breach of the classical laws of friction. The presliding displacement is found to be less than 5% of the contact diameter, and the interface mean shear stress at sliding inception is found to be slightly below the shear strength of the sphere material. Good correlation is found between the present experimental results and a recent theoretical model in the elastic-plastic regime of deformation.

Experimental Study of a Creeping Polymer Sphere in Contact With a Rigid Flat

The creep of a polymer sphere contacting a rigid flat under a constant normal load is investigated experimentally. An optical technique is used to observe in situ the evolution of the contact area while the increase of contact interference is measured simultaneously. The experimental results obtained with PTFE spheres of different diameters pressed against a sapphire flat under different normal loads are presented and the effect of sphere diameter and normal load on the creep of the contact parameters is discussed. The present experimental study validate recently published theoretical results of a contact model for a creeping sphere and a rigid flat showing that a universal similarity solution exists for the dimensionless creep interference and dimensionless creep contact area as functions of the dimensionless time.Copyright

Pre-Sliding of a Spherical Elastic-Plastic Contact

The elastic-plastic contact between a deformable sphere and a rigid flat during pre-sliding is studied experimentally. Measurements of friction force and contact area are done in real time along with an accurate identification of the instant of sliding inception. The static friction force and relative tangential displacement are investigated over a wide range of normal preloads for several sphere materials and diameters. It is found that at low normal loads the static friction coefficient depends on the normal load in breach of the classical laws of friction. The pre-sliding displacement is found to be less than 5 percent of the contact diameter, and the interface mean shear stress at sliding inception is found to be slightly below the shear strength of the sphere material. Good correlation is found between the present experimental results and a recent theoretical model in the elastic-plastic regime of deformation.Copyright

Very Early Stage of Elastic-Plastic Spherical Contact Fretting

The contact area, friction force and relative displacement evolution at the very early stage of fretting are investigated experimentally. Copper and steel spheres of various diameters are loaded against a hard sapphire flat by a range of normal loads deep into the elastic-plastic regime of deformation. A reciprocating tangential loading is then applied with a maximum loading below the static friction to avoid gross slip. Real-time and in situ direct measurements of the contact area, along with accurate measurements of the friction force and relative displacement, reveal substantial junction growth and energy dissipation mainly in the first loading cycle. The so called “slip amplitude” is found to be attributed to residual tangential plastic deformation rather than to interfacial slip. Elastic shake-down is observed for the 2.5% hardening steel spheres while plastic shake-down is observed in the case of the elastic perfectly plastic copper spheres.Copyright

Experimental Study of Static Friction in a Spherical Elastic-Plastic Contact

The elastic-plastic contact between a deformable sphere and a rigid flat during pre-sliding is studied experimentally. Measurements of friction force and contact area are done in real time along with an accurate identification of the instant of sliding inception. The static friction force and relative tangential displacement are investigated over a wide range of normal preloads for several sphere materials and diameters. It is found that at low normal loads the static friction coefficient depends on the normal load in breach of the classical laws of friction. The pre-sliding displacement is found to be less than 5 percent of the contact diameter, and the interface mean shear stress at sliding inception is found to be slightly below the shear strength of the sphere material. Good correlation is found between the present experimental results and a recent theoretical model in the elastic-plastic regime of deformation.Copyright

Theoretical and Experimental Investigation of Plastic Hysteresis in Spherical Contact Under Combined Normal and Tangential Loading

The behavior of an elastic-plastic contact between a deformable sphere and a rigid flat under combined constant normal and reciprocating tangential loading is investigated theoretically and experimentally. The theoretical model is based on the assumptions of full stick contact condition and elastic–linear kinematic hardening of the sphere material. Hysteretic change of friction force versus tangential displacement during reciprocating tangential loading is investigated along with the study of the change of the contact area and stress state in the elastic-plastic sphere. Good agreement between theoretical and experimental results is obtained.Copyright

In Situ and Real Time Optical Investigation of Junction Growth in Spherical Elastic-Plastic Contact

The contact area evolution during pre-sliding (junction growth) of copper spheres loaded against a hard sapphire flat is investigated experimentally. Tests are performed with a recently developed test rig for real-time and in situ direct measurements. The results provide a new insight of the junction growth mechanism showing new points of the sphere surface that are coming into contact with the flat. It is found that junction growth at sliding inception can cause up to 45 percent increase in the initial contact area that is formed under normal preload alone. Good correlation is found between the present experimental results and a theoretical model for medium and high normal preloads.Copyright

A Test Rig for the Contact Area Evolution During Pre-Sliding

An experimental test rig was developed in order to investigate elastic-plastic single micro-spherical contact under combined normal and tangential loading. This novel apparatus allows in situ and real time direct optical measurement of the real contact area (RCA) evolution in pre-sliding. It also allows relative displacement measurements under very low rates of tangential loading (down to 0.01N/s) to capture accurately the fine details at sliding inception. The RCA measurement is realized by direct optical observation technique, whereas two different image processing algorithms were implemented for the elastic and the elastic-plastic contact regimes.© 2006 ASME