Oscillatory Tribology Performed With a Commercial Shear Rheometer

Here, we introduce a custom-made setup which allows for performing oscillatory friction measurements using a commercial shear rheometer as a technical platform. The presented measuring head can hold both artificial and biological materials as probing pins, and the sample holder is designed such that it enables measurements on a broad range of materials including technical materials such as steel and PTFE, kidney-shaped PDMS layers, and cylindrical cartilage tissue samples. Control measurements performed with an established rotational tribology setup demonstrate that the friction coefficients obtained both in the presence and absence of macromolecular lubricants agree very well with those published in the literature. Finally, we show pilot experiments in which we probe friction at the lateral interface between two different materials. For this interfacial tribology geometry, we also quantify wear generation by means of optical profilometry.