An Investigation of Fretting Corrosion

Abstract

In this paper a series of experiments is described on the subject of fretting corrosion, an expression used to describe the surface damage occurring between two closely fitting surfaces subject to slight vibrational movement. The emphasis of the research has been placed upon obtaining quantitative measurements of the degree of fretting damage, and it has been shown that considerable reproducibility can be obtained, thus making it possible to correlate this measurement with such variables as total number of oscillations, load, or atmospheric humidity. Humidity variations have been shown to have a pronounced effect on both the form and total amount of damage, and this probably accounts for the large discrepancies between the observations obtained by different workers. Although most of the measurements have been made using lapped carbon-steel specimens, some results were obtained with other materials such as chromium, nickel, and gold. Nickel plating has been advocated as an anti-fretting surface, but the experiments clearly show this to be ineffective, unless it can be assumed that the nickel plating has the additional effect of reducing the slip between the two surfaces. The use of lubricated phosphated surfaces can be strongly recommended for inhibiting fretting corrosion, from the results obtained with this form of surface preparation rubbing against a steel flat. Additional experiments have been carried out with carbon-steel surfaces to establish the significance of the absorption and diffusivity of oxygen in surrounding liquid media.