Evaluation of 3-D Surface Textures Based on Contact Asperities and Application to CVT Pulley Surfaces

Abstract

This paper proposes a method of topographical characterization for tribo-surface textures based on contact asperities. BEM (boundary element method) simulation using the Boussinesq-Cerruti theory was employed to estimate the contact condition. Parameters such as contact area ratio, contact pressure, radius of curvature, etc., were evaluated from the contact condition. The proposed method was applied for understanding the mechanism of higher friction for a belt-CVT (continuously variable transmission). Results showed that the contact summit density and mean contact summit area have clear correlations with the coefficient of friction obtained by experiments.