Tribology and Materials | Volume 3 | Issue 3 | 2024 | 96-107
|
https://doi.org/10.46793/tribomat.2024.012
|
|
Radioactive tracers in industry: Thin layer activation of carbon-based materials for wear measurement
Alexander Hofer
1,
Ferenc Ditrói2,
Manuel Zellhofer1,
Sándor Takács2,
Thomas Wopelka1,
Andreas Kübler3, Martin Jech1
1 AC2T research GmbH,
Wiener Neustadt, Austria
2 HUN-REN Institute for Nuclear Research, Debrecen, Hungary
3 Robert Bosch GmbH, Stuttgart, Germany
Abstract: Thin layer activation (TLA) is already routinely utilised for online wear monitoring of metallic components with the radioisotope concentration (RIC) method for various tribological applications. However, many components in tribological systems are made of carbon-based bulk material (e.g. polymers) or have carbon-based wear resistant coatings (e.g. diamond-like carbon). By utilising the nuclear reaction 12C(3He,x)7Be, TLA can thus be employed in carbon-containing components. To evaluate the applicability of this approach for TLA in combination with the RIC method, three materials EPDM (ethylene propylene diene monomer), PEEK (polyether ether ketone) and DLC (diamond-like carbon), which are vastly utilised in tribology, were activated. Subsequently, the modulus of elasticity and hardness of the activated specimens were measured and evaluated if the material works for TLA. As EPDM developed cracks after the irradiation process, it is regarded to be not applicable for TLA and subsequent wear measurements. While the PEEK material revealed small changes in hardness values compared to non-irradiated samples, the irradiated DLC coating showed no detectable material changes. Both irradiated materials have been applied to representative tribological wear studies, for which the RIC results showed a good correlation with optical wear measurements.
Keywords: thin layer activation, carbon-based materials, RIC method, wear measurement, DLC, PEEK, EPDM.
Received: 27-05-2024, Revised: 26-07-2024, Accepted: 31-07-2024
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which allows users to distribute, remix, adapt,
and build upon the material in any medium or format for non-commercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator.
2 HUN-REN Institute for Nuclear Research, Debrecen, Hungary
3 Robert Bosch GmbH, Stuttgart, Germany
Abstract: Thin layer activation (TLA) is already routinely utilised for online wear monitoring of metallic components with the radioisotope concentration (RIC) method for various tribological applications. However, many components in tribological systems are made of carbon-based bulk material (e.g. polymers) or have carbon-based wear resistant coatings (e.g. diamond-like carbon). By utilising the nuclear reaction 12C(3He,x)7Be, TLA can thus be employed in carbon-containing components. To evaluate the applicability of this approach for TLA in combination with the RIC method, three materials EPDM (ethylene propylene diene monomer), PEEK (polyether ether ketone) and DLC (diamond-like carbon), which are vastly utilised in tribology, were activated. Subsequently, the modulus of elasticity and hardness of the activated specimens were measured and evaluated if the material works for TLA. As EPDM developed cracks after the irradiation process, it is regarded to be not applicable for TLA and subsequent wear measurements. While the PEEK material revealed small changes in hardness values compared to non-irradiated samples, the irradiated DLC coating showed no detectable material changes. Both irradiated materials have been applied to representative tribological wear studies, for which the RIC results showed a good correlation with optical wear measurements.
Keywords: thin layer activation, carbon-based materials, RIC method, wear measurement, DLC, PEEK, EPDM.
Received: 27-05-2024, Revised: 26-07-2024, Accepted: 31-07-2024
|
|
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which allows users to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon the material in any medium or format for non-commercial purposes only, and only so long as attribution is given to the creator.