Measurement of contact pressure distributions between surfaces by thermoelasticic stress analisys

The development of new techniques for the measurement of contact pressure distributions between bodies in contact is of large interest in mechanics, for the design and verify of many couplings between mechanical components. Examples are the contact between tooth of gears, between the balls and rings of ball bearings, between the wheel and rail etc. In this paper a new measurement technique is proposed, based on the measurement principle known as thermoelasticity. The particular case about the measurement of contact pressure distribution between a ball and a flat plate is discussed. Previous studies was performed in order to examine the contact surface between the two bodies realizing one of the two bodies in contact using an infrared transparent material, with appropriate values of the other mechanical properties. These studies were anyway only qualitative. In the present work, two calibration methodologies are proposed to obtain measures of contact surface stress between a ball and a flat. One of these methodologies is based on experimental test and the other one is based also on analytic results. The measured stress behaviours are in agreement with the classic Hertz theory; relative uncertainty is smaller than 0.1. This allows to obtain first quantitative results of contact pressure distribution by using thermoelasticity