Abstract
A tribotester with an integrated load sensor based on a strain gauge is typically used to measure the friction coefficient generated by the contact-related sliding motion of two objects. Since the friction coefficient is obtained by dividing the measured friction force by the applied normal force, the normal and friction forces must be measured for accurate analysis. In this study, a tribotester was used to measure the displacement of a cantilever tip using the fiberoptic sensor in a non-contact method. The friction coefficient measurement using the fiberoptic sensor was proven to be valid by calibrating the tip displacement due to normal/friction forces after designing a basic structural cantilever tip based on experiments and simulation analyses. The results obtained by using the fiberoptic sensor-cantilever tip-based tribotester were compared with those obtained using commercial and/or custom-built tribotesters under the same conditions. By designing various shapes of cantilever tips and using simulation analysis, the calibrations of the normal/friction forces and tip displacement could be verified and the coupling effect was evaluated. The performance and reliability of the fiberoptic sensor-cantilever tip-based tribotester, which can be used to determine the normal/friction forces by non-contact displacement measurements without a strain gauge, were verified.
Highlights
Problems related to friction and wear due to the relative sliding motion in the contact areas of the driving parts of mechanical equipment are increasing in the machine and material field
The load sensor that measures the friction force in the lateral direction is deformed by the normal force in the vertical direction because the normal force is applied by the vertical displacement of the cantilever tip, which is directly connected to the load sensor
A tribotester equipped with a fiberoptic sensor and cantilever tip was designed and produced and its performance as an experimental device that can be used to evaluate friction and wear properties was verified
Summary
Problems related to friction and wear due to the relative sliding motion in the contact areas of the driving parts of mechanical equipment are increasing in the machine and material field. Various studies have been conducted to reduce friction and wear phenomena in the contact area and the degree of the improvement of the friction properties is evaluated using diverse methods [6,7,8,9,10,11]. The friction force generated by the contact of two objects is measured and the friction coefficient, which is the friction force divided by the applied normal force, is used to evaluate the friction properties of the material. It has been reported that the friction coefficient varies depending on the applied normal force, especially in nanoscale experiments [12,13]. When the scale is small, there is the possibility that a minute change can affect the friction properties and the friction coefficient (tendency to frictional variation) may differ because the tendency of wear changes depending on the applied normal force
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