Oxidative wear of heat-treated steels

In the present work, the oxidative sliding wear of a heat-treated steel at low-sliding velocities (less than 1 m/s) has been investigated. It has been shown that this type of wear can be described by a mechanism that considers the formation and agglomeration of oxide debris during sliding. The results have been modeled using available equations for two different types of oxidative wear and it has been shown that the model proposed by Sullivan and Hodgson can be used to predict the sliding wear rate of heat-treated steels in the low-sliding velocity wear regime. In this context, the important role of the surface bulk temperature is highlighted. In view of the above consideration, it is also pointed out that wear maps, developed from laboratory test results, have to be critically used for the design of tribological systems. © 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.