Historical developments and new trends in tribological and solid lubricant coatings

In recent years, several new solid lubricant and modern lubrication concepts have been developed to achieve better lubricity and longer wear life in demanding tribological applications. Most of the traditional solid lubricants were prepared in the form of metal, ceramic and polymer-matrix composites. They have been used successfully in various engineering applications. Recent progress in thin-film deposition technologies has led to the synthesis of new generations of adaptative, self-lubricating coatings with composite or multilayered architectures, by using duplex/multiplex surface treatments. These modem self-lubricating coatings progressively make their way into the commercial marketplace and meet the ever-increasing performance demands of more severe applications. The present paper reviews our recent understanding of the lubrication mechanisms of both traditional and new solid lubricants, with particular emphasis on solid lubricant methods and practices. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.