Numerical Simulation of Sliding Wear for Self-lubricating Spherical Plain Bearings

Based on the thermo-mechanical finite element analysis method, a thermal wear simulation program was designed for the wear properties analysis of spherical plain bearing with self-lubricating fabric liners. In the program, the classical Archard wear model was applied to analyze the dynamical wear process of the bearing, and Abaqus scripting interface was used to simulate the progressive accumulation of wear between contact surfaces. The position of maximum wear depth occurs at the central contact region and this is in close agreement with test results. The relative error of the maximum wear depth between the FEA prediction and experimental results is a little more than 10%. It is shown that the complex nonlinear wear process can be simulated with a series of discrete quasi static models and the wear simulation program could be used to analyze the practical mechanical and tribological properties of the spherical plain bearings.