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Engineers who build components to last are naturally concerned with wear. There are different types of wear, and some engineers may induce wear purposely for varying reasons. Three types of wear are abrasion, adhesion, and corrosion. Each type has inherent problems and benefits that can be affected by materials, lubrication, and surface finish.
ABRASIVE
There are two common types of abrasive wear: two-body and three-body abrasion. Two-body abrasion refers to surfaces that slide across each other where the one (hard) material will dig in and remove some of the other (soft) material. An example of two-body abrasion is using a file to shape a workpiece. Three-body abrasion is where particles between the two surfaces remove material from one or both surfaces. The tumbling process is an example of this type.
Tumbling involves using particles to sand and polish the surface of a part. The particles that cause abrasion are often called contaminants. Contaminants are anything that enters a system that creates abrasion. While lubrication is imperative, an active lubrication system can introduce contaminants that cause abrasion. Filters remove contaminants and are one of the reasons why proper maintenance and replacement of filters is important. However, the...