The effect of pneumatic gas pressure on the wear behaviour of PTFE

Polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) is an important engineering material because of its unique structure and combination of properties. This paper reports the effect of pneumatic gas pressure on the wear response of PTFE. It is shown that the wear factor decreases significantly with an increase in pneumatic gas pressure. Possible explanations for this phenomenon include the change in mechanical properties of PTFE with applied gas pressure and the change of thermal conductivity of PTFE and gas with applied pressure.