A two-disk test rig for researching the damage behavior of rolling/sliding contact surfaces under extreme conditions

A two-disk test rig researching surface damage and ultimate performance of rolling-sliding tribo-parts in extreme conditions is designed. Variable speed (rolling speed up to 83.6m/s, sliding speed up to 16.4m/s) of the rolling/sliding contact are input by motor spindle and regulated with gear. Variable load (Hertzian contact up to 4GPa) is applied with hydraulic cylinder. High temperature (∼+300°C) and cryogenic environment(liquid nitrogen) is implemented by changing the lubricant condition. Thermal-stress analysis with ANSYS shows that the temperature and stress of the tester body is reasonable. As the signals judging failure, such parameters as temperature and vibration of the supporting bearing, power consumption of the main spindle, temperature of the tribo-parts surface are monitored in real time. Kingview, PLC, VB and MATLAB software are employed in the online monitoring system to collect data automatically. Types of tribo-parts were tested in the test rig, getting their ultimate performance and the effect of each parameter on surface damage.