Study on tribological properties of surface concave convex micro-texture on the mold steel

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to describe the tribological characteristics with different area density of concave-convex micro-texture on the mold surface. It is a new technology to improve the quality of the workpiece to control the tribological properties through the application of concave-convex micro-texture on the mold surface.

Design/methodology/approach

Five groups of laser micro-texture with different area density (ratio of the concave-convex micro-texture area to the all-area) were processed on the surface of the mold steel, and the tribological properties were compared with the smooth surface of the reference sample.

Findings

The time of the running-in stage in different experimental groups was about 300 s. The fluctuation amplitude of concave-convex micro-texture friction coefficient is much larger than that of smooth plane specimen in the running-in stage. After the running-in stage, the friction coefficients were lower than that in the smooth condition and decreased with the increase of the concave-convex micro-texture area density. When the area density reached 25%, the friction coefficients no longer decreased significantly. In addition, the wear of concave-convex micro-texture surface is much lower than that of smooth surface and decreases with the increase of concave-convex micro-texture area density.

Originality/value

Domestic and foreign scholars have done a lot of research on the relationship between concave micro-texture and tribological properties. However, the object of this paper is a new concave-convex micro-texture, which is rarely studied in the field of tribology.

Peer review

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/ILT-03-2020-0081/

Citation

Yang, X., Fu, Y., Ji, J., Chen, T. and Pan, C. (2020), "Study on tribological properties of surface concave convex micro-texture on the mold steel", Industrial Lubrication and Tribology, Vol. 72 No. 10, pp. 1167-1171. https://doi.org/10.1108/ILT-03-2020-0081