Sliding wear studies in glass-epoxy system through scanning microscopic observations

The work reports the wear occurring in a glass-epoxy composite system as a function of sliding distance for a constant sliding velocity and applied load. It is seen that the weight loss increases with increasing distance, but the gradient maintained all through is not the same. An attempt has therefore been made to correlate the weight loss with the scanning microscopic observations on the worn surfaces. It is found that in the early part, the wear of the resin/mat layer contributes to the phenomenon. The process of breakage of fibre into fragments and the resin debris formation accounts for the wear at a much later stage. The phenomenon occurring in between these two stages, is attributed to some of the broken fibres getting lodged in the matrix and agglomeration of the debris formed from the matrix material. Other features of interest are highlighted and discussed in this report.