TRIBOLOGY IN RELIABILITY ENGINEERING

K. HOLMBERG
VTT Manufacturing Technology, P. O. Box 1704, FIN-02044 VTT, FINLAND; e-mail: kenneth.holmberg@vtt.fi

SUMMARY
The tribological understanding of friction and wear mechanisms and the generation of reliable friction and wear data are
of increasing importance for the determination of reliability of machinery and availability of plants and transportation
systems. To be of real value in reliability engineering, the tribological data should be expressed in terms of endurance
life and probability of failure. The minimum coefficient of friction and the minimum wear data are important
scientifically and for optimal design and material development purposes, but they are of less relevance in reliability
estimation. The scaling-up of our tribological knowledge from nano- and microcontacts to solid performance estimations
and reliability predictions of large machines is a major challenge for the tribological society.

Keywords: reliability, tribology, design, monitoring, scaling

1 INTRODUCTION engineering, the different tribology-related methods that

A general trend in our society is to develop larger and
more advanced technical systems which are at the same
time more complex and difficult to control. The
availability of plants and transportation systems and the
reliability of machines and instruments is of increasing
importance. The failure of technical systems may result
in safety risks, and in large environmental risks.
Breakdowns in the industrial production process are
expensive for the industry and the whole society. There
is an increasing need for improved methods of
determining the reliability and predicting the lifetime of
machines and production systems more accurately.
Mechanical failures of components and especially
tribological failures, such as wear and friction-related
failures, are today one of the main reasons for
machinery break-down, plant shut-down and equipment
unavailability [1−5]. This paper deals with the role of
tribology in the large and complex scope of reliability
exists to improve reliability, and finally the scope of
tribology covering technical and scientific problems
from nanoscale up to terascale.
2 A HOLISTIC APPROACH TO
RELIABILITY
Since there is a great variety of different techniques
based on expert knowledge in the several fields of
technology involved, there is a need to approach the
reliability and maintainability problems from a general
holistic point of view starting from the problem of the
customer and ending with the satisfied user [4, 6]. This
is aimed at improving the synergistic interactions
between the different fields of expertise by showing a
logical and comprehensive structure, where each expert
can find his place and see the connections to experts
from other fields, all working with the same aim of well
controlled risks, failure frequency and lifetime, as shown
in Figure 1.

RISK CONTROL CORRECTIVE ACTION

ANALYSIS IMPROVEMENT - change of component
- improved design
Probability of personal-, equipment- - monitoring
and environmental damage - automatic diagnostics
Accident consequence estimation - inspections
- service
- redundancy
RELIABILITY CONTROL
- operational tests
ANALYSIS OPTIMIZATION

Identification of critical parts

System failure- and lifetime probability RISK ESTIMATION
Estimation of operability costs (LCC) FAILURE
PROBABILITY
LIFETIME
HUMAN ERROR CONTROL ESTIMATION
SOFTWARE FAILURE CONTROL
ELECTRONICS FAILURE CONTROL
MECHANICAL COMPONENT FAILURE CONTROL
WEAR CORROSION CREEP FATIGUE FRACTURE

k hfi 00/fi 1 d f
Figure 1: A holistic systematic approach to the improvement of the operational reliability, availability and
safety of products and industrial production systems.
3 COMPONENT RELIABILITY
The basic tribological phenomena –friction, wear and
lubrication – are all reliability-related. Friction in
machinery and equipment resists motion and can result
in energy losses and failure. Wear is a process of
material deterioration that will result in failure if it can
proceed far enough. Lubrication is the method of
controlling friction and wear by introducing a third
material between the interacting moving surfaces, which
can reduce energy losses and help avoid failure [5, 7].
One major challenge for the tribology society is: How
can we produce better tribological data of interacting
components to support actions for improved reliability?
In this context, it is not so important to find out what is
the minimum coefficient of friction that can be achieved
in a certain case, since it is not the situation with
minimum friction that is problematic. The risks of
failure and shut-down appear when the design value of a
coefficient of friction is exceeded, thus creating higher
frictional forces that may cause damage or stop intended
mechanical movements. Similarly, the low-wear situa-
tion is not the problem, but a problem may occur when
the wear rate for some reason exceeds the values in the
Endurance life
CUMULATIVE WEAR
Critical wear level Mild wear
TIME
Endurance life
Critical friction level
FRICTION
TIME
Figure 2: An increase in wear and friction may with time exceed the critical wear and friction levels and
then the operation is in the risk zone for total failure and shut-down.
design specification; this situation results in geometrical
changes and changes in tolerances between components,
and thus in possible inaccurate or even hazardous
movements or failures and shut-down.
What is important from a reliability point of view is to
produce more and better tribological data on the
endurance life and on the critical wear and friction
levels of tribological components, both in general and in
specific operational conditions.
Figure 2a illustrates schematically three situations of
component wear. In the first situation, severe wear is
starting already at an early stage of the operation due to
unsuccessful design. In the second situation a mild wear
condition is achieved after a running-in wear period and
a considerable safe operating time prevails until the
slowly proceeding wear damage of the surface results in
severe wear.
Finally, in the third situation successful design has
produced a contact condition, which, after a short
running-in wear, results in a long period of insignificant
wear. The repeated contact load will ultimately result,
however, in fatigue failure and catastrophic wear [8].
Catastrophic wear
ear
re w
e
Sev
Insignificant wear
The important question from a reliability point of view
is to produce tribological data and techniques with
which the endurance life can be estimated. The
endurance life is the time until the component can no
longer perform its planned function. The designed
endurance life is the time until the cumulative wear limit
for safe operation specified in the design specification,
the critical wear level, is exceeded in operation.
Similarly, as shown in Figure 2b, the changed contact
conditions can result in exceeding the endurance life
when an increase in the friction force exceeds the values
in the design specification, the critical friction level, and
a risk for safe operation occurs.
4 TRIBODATA FOR RELIABILITY
ASSESSMENT
There are four ways of getting the required tribological
data for the estimation of component endurance life and
risk for failure. They are: by collecting historical data
about how similar components have performed in
similar operational situations earlier; by using the
generic knowledge of tribological behaviour in
theoretical models and equations; by laboratory testing
of components and materials, and by on-line monitoring
of the tribological performance.
There is a lot of knowledge and experience to be gained
from observations of how similar components have
performed earlier in similar conditions. One problem is
of course that often the earlier operational conditions
may be more or less different from those to be
estimated, and thus the interpretation of the results
includes uncertainties. But the main problem is,
however, that today in almost all areas of industry this
information is not collected in such a systematic way
that it can easily be used for endurance life prediction.
The history data of used components is often collected
mainly for the use of legal safety or compensation-
related needs. To be useful, this data should be collected
by using operational and failure codes especially
developed for reliability estimation purposes [1, 9].
The quantitative friction and wear modelling that is
possible to do based on today's state-of-the-art
techniques has a large variation in the level of accuracy.
In some areas, such as in the calculation of surface
stresses or in the calculation of elastohydrodynamic
contact pressures and film thickness, there are quite
advanced and precise mathematically formulated
models. On the other hand, there is no model available
for the estimation of friction or wear in contacts with
coated surfaces in the presence of a fluid containing
contamination particles. Although a great number of
equations for friction and wear in dry sliding situations
have been proposed, their field of validity is still limited
to only some certain contact situations [10,11]. Here, the
most promising approach for producing useful
tribological data for reliability estimations is, in the
authors' opinion, not to use generic wear equations but
to develop component-specific friction and wear
models. In such a way, the geometrical and material-
related parameters can be fixed to a certain degree, and
the number of fluctuating variables can be limited to a
controllable level.
The laboratory testing of material combinations in
specific contact situations and environments is today
perhaps the most reliable way of gaining basic
tribological data for reliability control purposes. It is
essential that the experiments are planned and
performed specifically for estimating endurance life, as
discussed above. In addition to endurance life, another
reliability parameter that is important from a practical
point of view is the probability of failure. The
tribological data can be of crucial value to the machine
users when both the endurance life and the probability
of failure can be expressed in statistical terms. The
established experimental design techniques [3, 12] can
be put to good use here, and they should be utilised in
tribology laboratories much more.
When more reliability-related tribological data is
available, it makes it possible to classify it and to
systematically present it in similar forms as have been
done in the mapping of friction and wear data [13,14].
The maps are useful when we have first managed to
identify the two most dominant parameters on friction or
wear and then produced the map with these two
parameters as co-ordinate axes. Then we can place in
the map the window for planned operational conditions
defined in the design specification. It is obvious that for
safe operation there should be no serious transition
regions between different contact mechanisms in the
operational window. Defining the operational window in
tribological performance maps makes it possible to
calculate the expected variations in endurance life and
the probability of failure within this window, and if
required, also when moving outside the operational
window.
The aim should be that we can express our tribological
data in a way such as: "the endurance life of the
component will be more than 8 years with a 95% degree
of confidence" and "the probability of operation without
failure during the first three years is more than 98%".
With this kind of basic reliability data of components it
would be possible to estimate with a good degree of
accuracy the reliability of machines and the availability
of machinery systems and plants. This information is
essential in situations when decisions on new
investments, investments in diagnostic tools and
redundancy equipment, and decisions on unscheduled
shut-downs for repair have to be made.
5 CONDITION MONITORING AND
DIAGNOSTICS
During operation of machinery, actions can be taken to
improve the reliability and tribology has an important
role to play in this. By condition monitoring of the
performance, on-line information is obtained about the
stage of functional deterioration that may be due to, e.g.
the wear of surfaces. The area of condition monitoring
and diagnostic engineering today is an advanced and
highly developed field of engineering [1, 2]. It includes
the development of sensors to measure changes in
performance, data collection, signal processing,
diagnostics, prognostics and maintenance engineering,
as shown in Figure 3.
Particularly in the area of diagnostics, many new
software tools have been developed for automatically
performing appropriate conclusions based on the
received on-line performance information [15]. Such
new tools are expert systems, fuzzy logic, pattern
recognition and neural networks. The next step after
having made a proper diagnosis of the condition of the
machine is to predict how the performance will proceed
depending on what measures are to be implemented.
This kind of prognostics is very important support for
decision-making in situations where the consequences
may be great or serious. The last part of the chain is
maintenance engineering, which includes the knowledge
of different corrective actions that can be taken based on
the information obtained.
However, the whole chain from the signal detection by
the sensor to prognostics and maintenance decision-
making is of relevance only if the analysis of the signals
is based on a solid knowledge of the phenomena
observed. This is where tribology comes in. It is most
important in the case of friction and wear-related
monitoring that a solid understanding of the tribological
contact mechanisms forms the basis for the signal
processing, the diagnostic rules and the prognostic
predictions. Unfortunately, this is not always the case
today. Too often the engineers are satisfied with
managing to monitor some kind of signal and then
believing that advanced software techniques can
produce correct conclusions. Only by bringing good
FAILURE DETECTION
Wear
Sequence Fatigue
Fracture
Corrosion
Material science Sensor
Physics technology
Knowledge Mechanical
needed engineering
Figure 3: Condition monitoring and diagnostic engineering is a multi-technological task. Tribology is involved
in the failure mechanisms, diagnostic analysis and the prognostic predictions.
tribological understanding about the mechanisms behind
the functional deterioration observed can reliable
predictions be made.
The most common machinery condition monitoring
techniques used today are vibration analysis and oil
analysis. These are both very much related to the
tribological contact phenomena and a good tribological
understanding is essential. Other condition monitoring
techniques are performance measurements, such as
measuring rotational speeds, forces, displacements,
temperatures etc. [2].
6 RELIABILITY-BASED DESIGN
The design methods in use today are mainly based on
performance calculations and static or dynamic load and
durability analysis. New tools have recently been
developed that also take into account the reliability
aspects in design. One such tool is the reliability-based
design method developed by Virtanen [9,16]. The
method enables the effective prediction of the reliability
of a product in explicit form right at the design stage and
to use it, e.g. during the contract negotiations with a
customer. This method provides a design team with the
means to judge new and innovative ideas on the basis of
their predicted reliability, and it helps the team to focus
on the right target with their reliability engineering
efforts. The method also offers the possibility to analyse
the customer’s view of reliability requirements and to
compare this with what is technically possible to
achieve, as shown in Figure 4.
STOP START
DATA DIAGNOSTICS, CONCLUSIONS,
COLLECTION PROGNOSTICS ACTIONS
Signal Diagnostic Maintenance
analysis engineering engineering
Statistics Decision-
Information making
technology
The right-hand side of Figure 4 shows the process for
specifying the reliability requirements and priorities of
the customer for a specific product. This is quantified in
terms of reliability parameters such as mean-time-to-
failure (MTTF), mean-time-to-repair (MTTR), avail-
ability and maximum breakdowns. The left-hand side
shows the process for calculating the same reliability
parameters for the product based on the technical
performance of the component and the system. This is a
model-based simulation approach that starts with
building up a fault tree for the product. The possible
failures are estimated and classified according to best,
mean and worst cases of probable occurrence.
The fault tree that forms the basis for the reliability
simulation is based on failure data, diagnosis and
prediction models. In the case of wear or friction-related
failures, the estimation of the probability to appear
during certain periods in the lifetime of the component
and the estimation of the probable endurance lifetime is
based on the best available tribological data. This data
can be obtained from historical data analysis, from
theoretical models or from laboratory-produced data, as
described above. To be of use for the model, the data
should be presented as reliability-related parameters.
This emphasizes the importance for the tribology society
to produce friction and wear data for different material
combinations, as well as in different contact and
environmental conditions in the form of endurance life
or probability of failure. The data can then be of use in
reliability estimations and functional predictions of
components and machines. It is actually not very useful
at all if only the minimum achieved coefficient of
friction and the wear rate are known.
7 FROM NANOTRIBOLOGY TO
TERATRIBOLOGY
Relating tribology to machinery reliability and to plant
or transportation availability is very important and
responds to the increasing demands of both industry and
society. However, it is a great challenge to scale up the
knowledge we have on the friction and wear
mechanisms from tribological studies, which are
typically made on a micrometer scale in tribometers and
microscopes, to component and machinery systems that
can be as large as ferry boats or paper machines.
In tribology today we can see another trend, which is to
go to smaller and smaller sizes in the investigation of
friction and wear phenomena. Nanotribology is of
increasing interest for tribologists and here the scales are
coming down to the very basic dimensions of physical
elements such as atoms and molecules [17]. Emerging
technologies such as the atomic force microscope and
the surface force apparatus [18] have recently opened
the possibility to study friction and wear phenomena on
a molecular scale and to measure frictional forces
between contacting atoms at a nano-newton level.
Increased computational power has made it possible to
study friction and associated phenomena by molecular
dynamic simulations of sliding surfaces and to
investigate atomic-scale contact mechanisms [19].

Devising the reliability model Allocation of dependability requirements

Design engineer's Empirical Customer needs i.e. Building of

view of failure failure reasons dependability functional
reasons requirements hierarchy

Technical
solutions Allocation of
Building of the
requirements to
fault tree
functions
Improvement
and re-design of
Design engineer's product features
view of failure
reasons
RAM-requirements:
Simulation - MTTF
model Simulation of - MTTR
reliability and Conclusions - Availibility
sensitivity analysis
Experience and
generic data
banks Comparison of
Simulation run W32 GD Fuel Injection System Power Unit
simulation
"Mean" "Best" "Worst" MTTF MTTR A Max Breakdowns
MTTF 723456 937223 506543
results and 946275 13.6 0.999894 4
MTTR 12.5 13.6 12.3 requirements 473138 6.8 0.999894 8
Availability 0.99976 0.99988 0.99955

Figure 4: A novel reliability-based design method consisting of an advising reliability model and
an allocation model for the customers dependability requirements [9].
The increasing understanding of the tribological
phenomena on nanoscale creates the need to scale up
our nanoscale knowledge to conclusions on improved
prediction of friction and wear that takes place on a
more macroscopic scale, such as in practically
observable everyday life. An attempt to illustrate the
scaling up of the very basic friction and wear pheno-
mena all from atomic dimensions to global and universal
dimensions is shown in Figure 5 [20].
Nanotribology could also be called molecular tribology
because here the investigations concentrate on pheno-
mena related to the interaction between molecules and
atoms such as the effects of van der Waal´s forces and
single crystal structures of materials.
Microtribology or asperity tribology was introduced by
Bowden and Tabor [21] with their studies of friction,
wear and adhesion that take place at the peaks of the
surface topography. Phenomena such as fracture, elastic
and plastic deformation, debris formation, surface layer
formation and topography effects are of central
importance.
Macrotribology or contact-tribology was in focus in the
research at the beginning of the last century. These
works are related to contacts between gears, bearing
elements and rollers, and phenomena like Hertzian
contact pressure, elastohydrodynamic lubrication, and
wear mechanisms clearly observable by the naked eye
(scuffing, scoring, pitting) are of interest.
Component tribology or decitribology is related to de-
fining and measuring typical parameters originating
from the interaction of components and related to their
performance such as torque, forces, vibrations, clearance
and alignment.
Machinery tribology or unitribology describes the
performance-related phenomena for a system of
components assembled in a machine or a piece of
equipment. The parameters of interest are performance,
efficiency, reliability and lifetime estimation.
Plant tribology or kilotribology deals with a whole
system of machinery, structures and equipment – and
now parameters such as economy, risk levels,
availability and life-cycle costs are considered.
National tribology or megatribology extends the effects
and consequences to be seen from a nationwide
perspective, with the parameters of relevance such as
safety policy, research policy, transportation policy and
environmental policy.
Global tribology or gigatribology considers the effects
on a worldwide basis as one interacting system; the
effects that are dealt with are sustainable development,
politics and cultural and human survival.
Universe tribology or teratribology is the largest per-
spective today that the author can think of in this scaling
up exercise. But what does this mean? Is it the inter-
relations of material in our large space? Is it the mecha-
nisms for space enlarging, or is it mechanisms for the
creation of new life and cultures?
The scaling up from molecular phenomena all the way
up to universe tribology is an interesting exercise
because it shows that at all levels we have to do with
phenomena that are known to us to some extent. In this
sense, then, it shows that talking about ‘scaling up’ and
‘scaling down’ is relevant.

1012 Tm Universe tribology - Teratribology

???

109 Gm Global tribology - Gigatribology

Sustainable development, politics, survival

National tribology - Megatribology

106 Mm Safety, environmental, transportation and research policies

103 Km Plant tribology - Kilotribology

Economy, risk levels, availibility, life-cycle cost

1 m Machinery tribology - Unitribology

Performance, efficiency, reliability, lifetime

10-1 dm Component tribology - Decitribology

Torque, forces, vibrations, clearance, alignment

10-3 mm Contact tribology - Macrotribology

Hertz contact pressure, EHD, pitting, scuffing, scoring

10-6 µm Asperity tribology - Microtribology

Fracture, elastic and plastic deformation, debris, surface layers

Molecular tribology - Nanotribology

10-9 nm Molecules, atoms, van der Waal's forces, single crystals, strings

k hfi 00/fi 8 d f
Figure 5: Scaling up of tribological phenomena from nanotribology to teratribology.
However, this exercise also has a considerable risk. It
may give the impression that our whole universe is just a
mechanical system, like a complex mechanical clock,
and if we only knew all the details on the smallest
atomic and even subatomic level and knew all the laws
of interaction then we could calculate and predict what
takes place nationwide and on a global scale. This is by
no means the intention of the author. On the contrary,
there are today indications and opinions that criticize
such a mechanistic approach [20, 22, 23].
8 CONCLUSIONS
To be of real value in reliability engineering, the
tribological data should be expressed in terms of
endurance life and probability of failure. The minimum
coefficient of friction and the minimum wear data are
important scientifically as well as for the optimal design
and material development purpose, but they are of less
relevance for reliability estimation. The aim is to
transform the tribodata to reliability parameters such as
mean-time-to-failure (MTTF), mean-time-to-repair
(MTTR), availability and maximum number of break-
downs per time.
It is possible to express tribological effects on different
geometrical scales all the way from nanotribology,
perhaps even up to teratribology. However the foreseen
scaling-up of our knowledge will probably need other
more nonlinear approaches than the strict reductionism
to which we are accustomed.
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