Impact of the Oil Temperature on the Frictional Behavior of Laser-Structured Surfaces

Abstract

This study investigates how the beneficial effects of laser-manufactured surface microstructures on friction vary with varying oil temperature. Laser surface texturing (LST) is a favorable method to optimize friction and wear, which have always been considerable obstacles against the performance improvement of combustion engines. The aim of this study is to detect correlations between the dimensional parameters of the laser-textured surfaces and tribological performance at varying temperatures. Although the experiments are on a fundamental level, the obvious application of combustion engines has been selected to align the material, processing, and test parameters. A wide range of micro indentations—henceforth called “dimples”—were fabricated onto honed flat aluminum samples by means of ultrashort pulse laser texturing and the frictional behavior at different lubricating oil temperatures (30 and 90 °C) was analyzed.

Keywords:

• Laser surface texturing
• friction
• oil temperature
• aluminum