Tribological properties of PTFE/laser surface textured stainless steel under starved oil lubrication

Abstract Surface textures with dimples were fabricated on stainless steel surface by a Nd:YAG pulsed laser. Friction and wear behaviors were investigated by rubbing against PTFE under starved oil lubrication and the effect of dimple density from 2.0% to 20.9% was examined. The result shows that friction coefficient of stainless steel is reduced from 0.08 to 0.05 due to texturing, and the longevity of oil film is prolonged by 50%. The dimple density of 7.9–8.8% appears the optimal tribological performance with the friction coefficient of 0.055 and wear rate of 5.2×10 −7  mm 3 /N m. The beneficial effect of dimples is to act as oil reservoirs and the sink for capturing wear debris under starved lubrication.