Effect of Surface Topography on the Interface Tribological Behavior of Sliding Contact

In order to investigate the effect of surface topography on the tribological behavior in sliding contact interface formed during strip drawing, a new friction test device was built. The sample used was aluminum sheet with three kinds of textures, i.e. regular micro-cavity surfac, unidirectional groove surface and random surface. The lubricated friction tests were performed under high contact pressures at different sliding velocities. The three dimensional surface topography of samples before and after friction tests were measured with non-contact optical profilometer, and variations of surface topography of samples were analyzed by using 3D surface parameters of the 3D average surface roughness S_a, surface bearing index S_bi, void volume in centre zone V_vc and void volume in valley zone V_vv. Experimental results show that regular micro-cavity surface had lower friction coefficient than unidirectional groove surface and random surface. At a relatively low contact pressures, the friction coefficient of the three kinds of surfaces decreased with the increase of contact pressure, and at a relatively high contact pressures, the friction coefficient of the three kinds of surfaces increased with the increase of contact pressure. The friction coefficients of the three kinds of surface were significantly dependent on the sliding speed at a certain contact pressure. Surface topography, contact pressure and sliding speed were shown to be crucial factors to variations of tribological behavior in the interface during sliding.