• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.125-131
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• 2018

A precision tribometer consisting of a cantilever was designed to measure frictional forces in the micro-Newton range. As frictional forces are measured based on the bending of the cantilever, vibration of the cantilever is the most significant factor affecting the quality of the friction measurement. Therefore, improved design of the tribometer with double cantilevers and a connecting plate that united the two cantilevers mechanically was suggested. For the verification of the modified design of the tribometer, numerical analysis and experiments were conducted. Examination using the finite element method revealed that the tribometer with a double cantilever and a connecting plate exhibited faster damping characteristics than the tribometer with a single cantilever. In the experiment, effectiveness of the double cantilever and connecting plate for vibration reduction was also confirmed. Vibration of the tribometer with double cantilever decreased eight times faster than that of the tribometer with a single cantilever. The faster damping of the double cantilever design is attributed to the mechanical interaction at the contacting surfaces between the cantilever and the connecting plate. Tribotesting using the tribometer with a single cantilever resulted in random fluctuation of frictional forces due to the stick-slip behavior. However, using the tribometer with a double cantilever and connecting plate for the tribotest gave relatively uniform and steady measurement of frictional forces. Increased stiffness owing to using a double cantilever and mechanical damping of the connecting plate were responsible for the stable friction signal.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.21-25
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• 2003

The 440C stainless steel is used for ball bearings and bevel gears in the control rod drive mechanism for the integral reactor, SMART. The friction characteristics of 400C stainless steel a investigated in sliding motion using the reciprocating tribometer which can simulate the operating conditions of the control rod drive mechanism. Highly purified water is used as lubricant, and the water is heated and pressurized in the autoclave. Friction force on the reciprocating specimens is measured by the load cells and transformed into friction coefficient. It is verified that frictional characteristic of the 440c steel is not drastically changed up to operating temperature and variation of friction coeffcient at operating temperature from room temperature to 160$^{\circ}C$ is within 5%.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers Conference
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• 2001.06a
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• pp.96-99
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• 2001

The fatigue life of support bearings is one of the most critical factors for the performance of a control rod driving mechanism. They are operated at high temperature and high pressure and especially lubricated with dramatically low viscosity water. The support bearing is made of standardized 440C stainless steel, and it supports thrust load including the weight of the driving system and external force. Friction and wear characteristics of this material operating under severe lubrication condition is not well known yet, although it is expected to be changed with respect to temperature and boundary pressure. So the friction characteristics are investigated in sliding conditions using the reciprocating tribometer which can simulate the operating conditions. Highly purified water is used as lubricant, and the water is heated up and pressurized. Friction farce on the reciprocating specimens is monitored by the load cells. The results of the experiments are presented in this paper.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2013.05a
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• pp.1231-1232
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• 2013

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers Conference
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• 2002.10b
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• pp.289-290
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• 2002

Stainless steel ball bearings are used in the control element drive mechanism and driving mechanisms such as step motor and gear boxes for the integral nuclear reactor, SMART. The bearings operate in pressurized pure water (primary coolant) at high temperature and should be lubricated with only this water because it is impossible to supply greases or any additional lubricant since the whole nuclear rector system should be perfectly sealed and the coolant cannot contain ingredients for bearing lubrication. Temperature of water changes from room temperature to about 120 degree Celsius and pressure rises up to 15MPa in the nuclear reactor. It can be anticipated that the frictional characteristics of the ball bearings changes according to the operating conditions, however little data are available in the literature. It is found that friction coefficient of 440C stainless steel itself does not change sharply according to temperature variation from the former research, and the friction coefficient is about 0.45 at low speed range. In this research frictional characteristics of the assembled ball bearings are investigated. A special tribometer is used to simulate the axial loading and the bearing operating conditions, temperature and pressure in the driving mechanism in the nuclear reactor. Highly purified water is used as lubricant ‘ and the water is heated up to 120 degree Celsius and pressurized to 15MPa. Friction force is monitored by the torque transducer.

• Journal of Mechanical Science and Technology
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• v.18 no.9
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• pp.1668-1679
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• 2004

The design of an axial piston pump for electro-hydrostatic transmission systems requires accurate information where and how much the internal friction and flow losses are produced. This study is particularly focused on the friction losses of a bent-axis type hydraulic piston pump, aiming at finding out which design factors influence its torque efficiency most significantly. To this end, the friction coefficients of the pump parts such as piston heads, spherical joints, shaft bearings, and valve plate were experimentally identified by a specially constructed tribometer. Applying the experimental data to the equations of motion for pistons as well as to the theoretical friction models for the pump parts, the friction torques produced by them were computed. The accuracy of the computed results was confirmed by the comparison with the practical input torque of the pump. In this paper, it is shown that the viscous friction forces on the valve plate and input shaft bearing are the primary source of the friction losses of the bent-axis type pump, while the friction forces and moments on the piston are of little significance.

• Steel and Composite Structures
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.939-952
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• 2015

In this paper, brake pad performance of two organic matrix composites namely, Sample 1 (contains no brass filler) and Sample 2 (contains 1.5% brass filler), is studied based on tribological and squeal noise behavior. In the first stage, a pin-on-disc tribometer is used to evaluate the frictional behavior of the two pads. On the following stage, these pads are tested on squeal noise occurrence using a drag-type brake dynamometer. From the two type of tests, the results show that; (i) brass fillers play a dual role; firstly as reinforcing element of the brake pad providing primary contact sites, and secondly as solid lubricant by contributing to the formation of a layer of granular material providing velocity accommodation between the pad and the disc; (ii) brass fillers contribute to friction force stabilization and smooth sliding behavior; (iii) the presence of small weight quantity of brass filler strongly contributes to squeal occurrences; (iv) there is close correlation between pin-on-disc tribometer and brake dynamometer tests in terms of tribological aspect.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.06a
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• pp.151-156
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• 2001

Experimental frictional and wear characteristics of silicon graphite materials is studied in this paper. Those specimens are lubricated with high temperature and highly pressurized water to simulate the same operating condition for the journal bearing and the thrust bearing on the main coolant pump bearing in the newly developing nuclear reactor named SMART(System-integrated Modular Advanced ReacTor). Operating condition of the bearings is realized by the tribometer and the autoclave. Friction coefficient and wear loss are analyzed to choose the best silicon graphite material. Pin on plate test specimens are used and coned disk springs are used to control the applied force on the specimens. Wear loss ana wear width are measured by a precision balance and a micrometer. The friction force is measured by the strain gauge which can be used under high temperature and high pressure. Three kinds of silicon graphite materials are examined and compared with each other, and each material shows similar but different results on frictional and wear characteristics.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.109-115
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• 2001

The lubricating performance of 23 kinds of polyol ester base oils 〔POEs〕 having different branch shapes was investigated by using a four ball tribometer under boundary lubrication condition. All the polyol ester base oils used in this study were made up of polyhydric alcohols of two-four valence and normal or branched fatty acids of different carbon number. The wear characteristics of polyol ester base oils are different from those of mineral oil, strongly affected by the branch shapes of fatty acids in their molecles. In particular, the polyol ester base oils having normal fatty acids such as n-octanoic acid, n-nonanoic acid etc. show much better wear performance than POEs having branched fatty acids such as 2-ethylhexanoic acid, 3,5,5-trimethyl hexanoic acid, etc. As the carbon chain length of normal fatty acids, in case of POEs of normal fatty acids, is increased, their wear rate is decreased and, in case of POEs of branched fatty acids, as the degree of branch of branched fatty acids is decreased, their wear rate is decreased. All the wear results of polyol ester base oils could be reasonably explained by comparing cohesive ability among fatty acid molecules in adsorption film by fatty acids obtained as POEs were decomposed.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.106-113
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• 2019

We investigated the application of tetrahedral amorphous carbon (ta-C) coatings to fabricate a glass lens manufactured using a glass molding process (GMP). In this work, ta-C coatings with different thickness (50, 100, 150 and 200 nm) were deposited on a tungsten carbide (WC-Co) mold using the X-bend filter of a filtered cathode vacuum arc. The effects of thickness on mechanical and tribological properties of the coating were studied. These ta-C coatings were characterized by atomic force microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, nano-indentation measurements, Raman spectrometry, Rockwell-C tests, scratch tests and ball on disc tribometer tests. The nano-indentation measurements showed that hardness increased with an increase in coating thickness. In addition, the G-peak position in the Raman spectra analysis was right shifted from 1520 to $1586cm^{-1}$, indicating that the $sp^3$ content increased with increasing thickness of ta-C coatings. The scratch test showed that, compared to other coatings, the 100-nm-thick ta-C coating displayed excellent adhesion strength without delamination. The friction test was carried out in a nitrogen environment using a ball-on-disk tribometer. The 100-nm-thick ta-C coating showed a low friction coefficient of 0.078. When this coating was applied to a GMP, the life time, i.e., shot counts, dramatically increased up to 2,500 counts, in comparison with Ir-Re coating.