Effect of Contact Conformity on Grease Lubrication

Abstract

This work focused on the experimental study of grease lubrication mechanisms around contacts in radial ball bearing 6314. The main objective of this work was to show the influence of conformities and their impact on grease lubrication in ball bearings. For the experiments, a tribometer of ball-on-ring configuration was used and fluorescence microscopy was chosen as the observation method. The results showed that, under starvation conditions, a conformity of 0.52 at velocities around 2 m/s produces a 50% thicker lubricating film than a conformity of 0.58. The available amount of lubricant around the contact area for conformity 0.52 was approximately three times less than that for conformity 0.58, and the same ratio was observed for the amount of lubricant on the rolling track. Experiments show that a realistic tribometer geometry allows a more accurate experimental study of the lubrication mechanisms of greases in ball bearings.