SECTOR FOCUS: TRIBOLOGY
Tribology – just a toolbox or the key to our future?
Dr. Manfred Jungk, MJ Tribology
In light of increasingly relevant challenges to the lubricants industry such as reducing the cost of renewable energy, energy saving as a source and emission free mobility the question “which role will tribology play?” should be an obvious one. Earlier this year the Gesellschaft für Tribologie (German Society for Tribology) conducted a study to determine the status quo and the potential impact of tribology in the academic and industrial landscape of Germany. Before summarising the results of that study, it is necessary to point out the interdisciplinary nature of tribology. As shown in the diagram below, created by Prof. Friedrich Franek, each of the traditional disciplines such as mechanical engineering, chemistry, physics and material science cannot individually cover the ground needed to describe a tribological system which deals primarily with friction, wear and lubrication.
It is also worth noting that the potential impact of reducing friction and wear by optimising lubrication have been the topic of various studies in the past. In 1971 the report DFG Forschungsbericht ZUM SCHWERPUNKTPROGRAMM VERSCHLEISS, REIBUNG, SCHMIERUNG described the results of research projects that were conducted between 1960 and 1969 at 20 Institutions with a budget of 4.5 Million Deutschmarks (€2.3 Million). It was concluded that the results do not present a viable theory around the understanding of friction and wear. However, it demonstrated that the
importance of scientifically verified facts
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as a foundation for discussions to tackle existing problems.
Following this, in 1977, ASME Energy Conversation through Tribology was published. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers described a Research and Development plan of $24 Million, which would have the potential to save $16 Billion in energy costs.
In 1981, Peter Jost published Jost Proc Instn Mech Engrs Vol 195 151-170. He reported that by applying predominantly extant tribological knowhow to relatively low research and development efforts energy savings of between £468 million and £700 million could be achieved in the UK alone. Some years later in 1988, the German government funded research program BMFT/DFVLR Abschlussbericht des Forschungsvorhabens 01 ZT 291 – ZA/NT was published, and concluded that annual energy savings of 5.4 Billion Deutschmarks (€2.76 Billion) could be accomplished by applying tribological based means.
Figure 3: graphic to illustrate the multi-disciplinary nature of tribology, created by prof. Friedrich Franek
More recently, Holmberg, Andersson, Erdemir Tribology International 47 (2012) 221-234 was published in 2012, in which the authors described the global energy consumption of passenger cars due to friction losses. A short term (5-10 years) reduction of the friction losses by applying new technologies could reduce those by 18% and thus lead to savings of €117 Billion, equivalent of 290 Million tons of carbon-dioxide emissions.
LUBE MAGAZINE NO.154 DECEMBER 2019
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