Investigation of frictional characteristics of laser textured aluminium 6061 and aluminium 7071 alloys under dry sliding conformal contact in pin on disc tribometer

• Main Authors: Krishna Kumar, P., Sathish Kumar, A.
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Subjects: Al6061 alloy; Al7075 alloy; Friction; Laser texturing; Pin-on-disc
• ISSN: 2214-7853; 2214-7853
• DOI: 10.1016/j.matpr.2020.02.735

Laser surface texturing (LST) is a viable technique of surface engineering to exhibit significant improvement in frictional behaviour. This paper represents an investigative study on the frictional characteristics of aluminium 6061 alloy and aluminium 7075 alloys using pin-on-disc tribometer. LST produces a very huge number of micro dimples on the sliding path surface of the pin, these micro dimples act as a micro-hydrodynamic bearing in full lubrication condition and as a micro – trap for wear debris in dry sliding condition. Three different patterns of micro – dimples such as circle, square and triangle has been generated on the sliding path surface of the pin using laser texturing technique. Upon investigation, LST has significantly improved the friction characteristics of Al 6061 alloy and Al 7075 alloy. Among all the combinations of three different patterns of micro – dimples, laser textured Al 6061 alloy with the triangular pattern has shown the lowest friction co-efficient value in the range of 0.170–0.184. This work also highlights that the application involving Al6061 alloy and Al7075 alloy can be made effective by laser surface texturing, where the friction is a major concern.