MOVEMENT PATTERNS OF ABRASIVE PARTICLES IN 3-BODY ABRASION

The movement patterns of abrasive particles in three-body abrasion are very important to the wear of materials. In the present paper, the movement of a single abrasive particle could be observed in detail through new wear apparatus for three-body abrasion. The new apparatus was used to carry out short-travel wear testing for a single particle sandwiched between two metal surfaces and to measure the frictional force at the same time. A number of experiments showed that there were mainly two kinds of movement patterns of the particles, ie. sliding and rolling. Based on the experimental results, a criterion Was proposed for the movement patterns of abrasive particles. The criterion matched with the experiments quite well.