Grinding damage of silicon nitride determined by abrasive wear tests

Abstract

Silicon nitride shows promise as a material for high speed rolling contact bearings, but experimental test results have been very varied, perhaps because the manufacturing techniques have introduced varying amounts of surface damage. A technique has been developed for accurately measuring the relative abrasive wear resistance of solids; silicon nitride samples surface ground to various depths have been measured. It was found that the abrasive wear resistance of each sample was lowered for a distance approximately equal to the depth of cut; this suggests that, in manufacturing silicon nitride bearing components, care must be taken that the final finishing operations remove the surface damage introduced by the earlier stages.