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Another perspective: False brinelling and fretting corrosion

Article  in  Lubrication Engineering · April 2004

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 Case Study

Another Perspective:
False Brinelling and
Fretting Corrosion
By Robert Errichello Douglas Godfrey’s December 2003 TLT arti- WIND TURBINES
cle [1] on false brinelling and fretting corro- As pointed out by Godfrey, a wind turbine
GEARTECH sion provided an excellent discussion of gearbox is susceptible to fretting wear.
Townsend, Montana both wear mechanisms. This article pres- Figure 1 shows the high-speed pinion from
ents observations and conclusions regard- a modern wind turbine. With the high-
ing fretting wear derived from investiga- speed pinion stopped by the brake, and
tions of gearbox failures. the rotor buffeted by the wind, the mating
gear rocks back and forth through small
amplitude motion.
The four faint lines in Figure 1 are false
brinelling that occurred when the wind tur-
bine was parked for a short time under light
winds. The three prominent red lines are
Figure 1. fretting corrosion that occurred when the
wind turbine was parked for an extended
period under heavy winds.
Figure 2 shows the outer raceway of a
rolling-element bearing, also from a wind
turbine, which suffered false brinelling and
fretting corrosion when the wind turbine
was parked.
Fretting corrosion also can occur when a
wind turbine is rotating. It occurs on com-
ponents such as splines or blade pitch
bearings that are subjected to small-ampli-
tude, vibratory motion. Splines are espe-
cially vulnerable to fretting corrosion
because, unlike gears, whose rotation
entrains lubricant between mating gear
teeth, splines have small sliding motion
False brinelling in a high-speed pinion from a modern wind turbine.
with essentially no motion to entrain lubri-
cant between mating spline teeth. Blade
pitch bearings are susceptible to fretting
wear if the blades remain at one pitch angle
for too long, and the lubricant is not replen-
ished by movement of the rolling elements.

34 APRIL 2004 T R I B O LO G Y & LU B R I C AT I O N T E C H N O LO G Y

HYDROELECTRIC GEARBOX
EXAMPLE
A gearbox from a hydroelectric power plant
was removed from service and shipped by
Figure 2.
truck from the power plant in Idaho to a
repair shop in Pennsylvania. This was a
large planetary gearbox with a 0.5-m diam-
eter sun pinion, three 0.8-m diameter plan-
et gears and a 2.1-m diameter annulus gear.
The sun pinion floats and is supported by
the three planet gears. Each planet mesh-
es with the pinion and the annulus gear.
During gearbox disassembly, false
brinelling and fretting corrosion of varying
degrees was found on all teeth that were in
contact during shipping. Each planet gear
had areas that supported the mass of the
sun pinion. Loads from the sun pinion cre-
ated torque on the planet gears causing
them to rotate slightly and load the annu-
lus gear teeth. False brinelling and fretting corrosion in the outer raceway of a
Consequently, many teeth were in con- rolling-element bearing.
tact and subjected to different loads,
depending on the positions of the planet
gears. Fretting wear varied from mild false
brinelling to severe fretting corrosion due
to different load intensity and vibration due Figure 3.
to transport.
Figure 3 shows an area on the planet
gear teeth with false brinelling. The contact
area is surrounded by black debris assumed
to be magnetite as described by Godfrey
[1]. When magnetite powder mixes with oil
in the meniscus around the contact, it
forms a black mixture with the consistency
of grease.
In some contacts with magnetite debris,
the damage was limited to false brinelling.
In other contacts with relatively large
amounts of magnetite debris, the area of
false brinelling had small patches of fret-
ting corrosion at the center of the false
brinelling scar as shown in Figure 3. Appar-
ently, the magnetite debris formed a dam False brinelling on planet gear teeth.
around the contact, which prevented oil
from entering, and the contact eventually

CONTINUED ON PAGE 36

T R I B O LO G Y & LU B R I C AT I O N T E C H N O LO G Y APRIL 2004 35

 CONTINUED FROM PAGE 35

Fretting corrosion became unlubricated. Without lubrication,
occurs under the damage escalated into fretting corro-
sion. This result corroborates Godfrey’s [1]
unlubricated
assertion that fretting corrosion occurs in
conditions. unlubricated contacts.
CONCLUSIONS
The following conclusions were derived
from empirical observations made during
many failure investigations:
False brinelling occurs under boundary
lubrication. The wear mechanism is mild
adhesion that is confined to the natural
oxide layer. On steel, the wear debris is
magnetite.
Fretting corrosion occurs under unlubri-
cated conditions. The wear mechanism is
severe adhesion that breaks through the
natural oxide layer and forms strong welds
with parent material. On steel, the wear
debris is hematite.
Fretting wear can start as false brinelling
and escalate into fretting corrosion when
magnetite wear debris dams the oil causing
the contact to become unlubricated. <<
Bob Errichello is a gear consultant with Geartech in
Townsend, Montana. He can be reached at RLE
gears@aol.com.
REFERENCES
1) Douglas Godfrey, “Fretting Corro-
sion or False Brinelling?” Tribology &
Lubrication Technology, December
2003, pp. 28-30.

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36 APRIL 2004 T R I B O LO G Y & LU B R I C AT I O N T E C H N O LO G Y

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