TEMPERATURE DISTRIBUTION AND THERMAL-DEGRADATION OF THE LUBRICANT IN EHL LINE CONTACT CONJUNCTIONS

Temperatures of the lubricant in the inlet zone, the central contact z one, and the outlet zone of EHL line contact conjunctions were simulta neously calculated for a complete range of sliding conditions by using the new thermal circular non-Newtonian EHL model. The complete range of sliding conditions includes pure rolling, normal sliding, simple sl iding, and opposite sliding. The result reveals the strong effect of s liding condition on the magnitude and distribution of the lubricant te mperature. It also shows the diffusion time effect on the lubricant te mperature, which builds up near the slower moving solid surface in the inlet zone. The effect of viscous normal stress on the temperature di stribution was also investigated. Results indicate that the effect is nor significant except for applications at very high entraining veloci ties. In addition, thermal degradation of the lubricant was studied. R esults show that if may become a problem for applications at high spee ds and high sliding conditions.