Introduction to Friction | Engineering Mechanics - Civil Engineering (CE) PDF Download

Friction:

Tangential forces generated between contacting surfaces are called friction forces and occur to some degree in the interaction between all real surfaces. Whenever a tendency exists for one contacting surface to slide along another surface, the friction forces developed are always in a direction to oppose this tendency.

Friction forces are present throughout nature and exist in all machines no matter how accurately constructed or carefully lubricated. A machine or process in which friction is small enough to be neglected is said to be ideal. When friction must be taken into account, the machine or process is termed real. In all cases where there is sliding motion between parts, the friction forces result in a loss of energy which is dissipated in the form of heat. Wear is another effect of friction.

Types of Friction: In this article we briefly discuss the types of frictional resistance encountered in mechanics. The next article contains a more detailed account of the most common type of friction, dry friction.

(a) Dry Friction. Dry friction occurs when the unlubricated surfaces of two solids are in contact under a condition of sliding or a tendency to slide. A friction force tangent to the surfaces of contact occurs both during the interval leading up to impending slippage and while slippage takes place. The direction of this friction force always opposes the motion or impending motion. This type of friction is also called Coulomb friction. The principles of dry or Coulomb friction were developed largely from the experiments of Coulomb in 1781 and from the work of Morin from 1831 to 1834.

(b) Fluid Friction. Fluid friction occurs when adjacent layers in a fluid (liquid or gas) are moving at different velocities. This motion causes frictional forces between fluid elements, and these forces depend on the relative velocity between layers. When there is no relative velocity, there is no fluid friction. Fluid friction depends not only on the velocity gradients within the fluid but also on the viscosity of the fluid, which is a measure of its resistance to shearing action between fluid layers.

(c) Internal Friction. Internal friction occurs in all solid materials which are subjected to cyclical loading. For highly elastic materials the recovery from deformation occurs with very little loss of energy due to internal friction. For materials which have low limits of elasticity and which undergo appreciable plastic deformation during loading, a considerable amount of internal friction may accompany this deformation. The mechanism of internal friction is associated with the action of shear deformation, which is discussed in references on materials science. Because this book deals primarily with the external effects of forces, we will not discuss internal friction further.