Abstract
In this study tribological investigations were carried out on different short fibre reinforced thermoplastic bearing materials, in particular on injection moulded samples of PA46-, PPA-, PPS-, and PEI-compounds with different amounts of glass fibers and PTFE. The objective was to characterise the friction and wear properties of these composites under dry sliding and dry fretting conditions. Experiments were performed within moderate pv-ranges at room temperature and also at elevated temperatures. The findings prove that using PTFE as an internal lubricant results in an improvement in the tribological behavior of all polymers tested. The abrasive effect of the reinforcing short glass fibers was more intense under fretting wear than under sliding wear conditions. The strongest influence of the different testing methods was obtained for the PPS-compound. Regarding all the tests performed, the PA46- and PPA-compounds showed the best tribological behavior.