Wear Characteristics of the Material Specimen and Method of Predicting Wear in Floating Spline Couplings of Aero-Engine

Abstract

In order to reduce wear and design high-performance spline coupling, the friction coefficient, wear coefficient, and wear depth of 14 groups of material specimens were tested using multifunctional friction and wear tester. The effect of materials, loads, rotation speed, and surface treatment on friction coefficient, wear coefficient, and wear depth was investigated. A method using an Archard’s equation based on the finite element method to calculate the wear depth of 14 groups of material specimens was proposed, and the results were consistent with the experimental results. Then, the wear of a floating involute spline coupling of aero-engine was predicted using this method. It can be concluded that carburizing and silvering can decrease the friction coefficient. The wear and wear coefficient decreased after carburizing. So, it is necessary to take 18CrNi4A with carburization and 32Cr3MoVA with nitridation as the material of the spline coupling in aero-engine to minimize wear. Furthermore, the method presented to predicate the wear of spline coupling in this work provided a good fundament for the fatigue prediction methodology of spline coupling.