Combined effects of shear thinning and viscous heating on EHL characteristics of rolling/sliding line contacts

The combined influence of shear thinning and viscous heating on the behavior of film thickness and friction in elastohydrodynamic lubrication (EHL) rolling/sliding line contacts is investigated numerically. The constitutive equation put forward by Carreau is incorporated into the model to describe shear thinning. An extensive set of numerical simulations is presented. Comparison of the film thickness predictions with published experiments reveals good agreement, and it is shown that thermal effect plays an important role in the precise estimation of EHL film thickness and friction coefficient. Parametric simulations show that thermal effect in shear-thinning fluids is strongly affected by the power-law index used in the Carreau equation. Comparisons of prediction of the Newtonian fluid model are presented to quantify the degree to which it overestimates the film thickness.