3 PhD candidates on Lubricated rolling contacts

The project is a collaboration with three major industrial partners and innovates lubricated rolling contacts, which are among the most efficient and widely used tribological contacts. Losses due to friction and wear are directly related to the societal themes of energy and circularity: friction reduction implies reduced energy loss, while diminishing wear extends lifetime.

The collaboration with three industrial partners involves three different systems involving rolling contacts. These being the skin pass rolling process, a cam follower contact, and a roller bearing. Although very different applications, key is the necessity to predict roughness changes and wear processes of lubricated rolling contact with partial slip as well as to reduce friction in lubricated contacts with a very low slide to roll ratio. Thus, a deeper understanding of friction generation in greases as well as in highly dynamic contacts like a cam follower contact needs to be developed. As one of the PhD candidates, your focus will be on one of the three systems, but there is a significant amount of collaboration with the other PhD candidates involved.