An elastic–plastic investigation of third body effects on fretting contact in partial slip

In this investigation, the third body effects in fretting contact is modeled using the commercially available ABAQUS finite element (FE) software. A two dimensional Hertzian line contact model is simulated in the presence of third bodies at the contact interface. The third bodies are modeled using simplified geometry like cylinders. Elastic–plastic material properties are used to model both the first bodies and third bodies. The FE model is used to investigate fretting phenomena under different displacement amplitudes and the influence of third body particles on contact stress and contact slip. In addition, the effects of different factors such as material properties of the third bodies and number of third body particles on fretting are investigated. Fretting loops obtained from the model show notable differences in shear stress distribution when compared to smooth Hertzian line contacts in the absence of third body particles. The results indicate that the third bodies deformed to platelet like structures as observed in experiments. The obtained results also indicate that contact stress decreases with the increase in the number of third bodies. As the number of third bodies in contact is increased, the contact shear force between the first bodies decreases while the contact slip increases. Due to this phenomenon, the dissipated energy is not affected and therefore does not influence fretting wear rate significantly. Although fretting wear rate is not directly influenced by the presence of third bodies, plastic deformation of the first body surfaces influences contact parameters which in turn impacts fretting wear.