Effects of Surface Roughness on Frictional Behaviour of Solid Organic Lubricants for Sheet Metal Forming Processes

Abstract

In the last decades, national legislations have become even more restrictive about the application and the disposal of hazardous lubricants in sheet metal forming. As a result, metal forming industry, which traditionally has made large use of synthetic and oil-based lubricants to enhance the production rate and reducing the wear of tools, has been forced to study and develop new solutions to reduce the environmental impact of production processes. The introduction and the continuous improvement of environmental friendly lubrication systems has seen a continuous growth and attention, but today the usage of traditional hazardous lubricants is still significant, requiring expensive cleaning operations and harmful cleaning agents to remove them. The use of solid organic lubricants can reduce or eliminate this drawback, despite their performances may be significantly affected by specific process parameters and the presence of debris. In this paper the performances of a solid organic lubricant have been compared to traditional liquid lubricants applied to sheet metal forming applications. Different surface topographies have been reproduced and the effects in terms of frictional behaviour have been investigated.