Wear of aluminium bronze in sliding contact with lubricated stainless steel sheet material

Aluminium bronze, well known for its good sliding properties, is frequently applied as tool material in sheet metal forming (SMF) of stainless steel, e.g. for the production of washing, refrigeration and cooking equipment. The limited hardness of the material makes it, however, sensitive to tool wear that is: volumetric wear of the tool due to sliding contact with the sheet material. Conventional wear tests like the rubber wheel abrasion test or the Taber abrader test cannot be used to simulate the interaction of the tooling with lubricated sheet material. Dedicated tribo tests are therefore conducted with the slider-on-sheet test. The aim of the research is to measure the specific wear rate of aluminium bronze at SMF-like conditions. Experimental results showed a pronounced influence of lubricant selection and sheet material selection. The measured specific wear rate varied from 10−8 mm3/N m for a smooth stainless steel sheet quality to 10−6 mm3/N m for a rough surface quality.