Understanding the Types of Bearing Wear and How to Prevent Them
Need a Bearing that Delivers Longer Wear to Improve Equipment Uptime?
The Types of Bearing Wear
Bearing wear generally falls into a few recognizable categories: abrasive wear (from contamination or an overly rough shaft finish), adhesive wear (from insufficient lubrication causing surfaces to bond and tear at a microscopic level), fatigue wear (from repeated cyclic loading), and fretting wear (from small, repetitive vibration-driven motion). Identifying which type is occurring is the first step to solving it, since each has a different root cause and a different fix.
Wear accelerates when a bearing experiences boundary lubrication (insufficient film to separate surfaces), abrasive contamination, incorrect shaft finish, or loads and speeds beyond the material's PV rating. In metal and bronze bearings, this often shows up as scoring, pitting, or catastrophic failure. Composite bearings are engineered to wear gradually and predictably instead.
How TriStar Validates Wear Performance
TriStar's engineering team uses tribology testing, measuring coefficient of friction, wear rate, and transfer film formation under controlled conditions, to confirm that materials perform as specified before they reach production. Testing has also shown a direct link between shaft surface finish and wear rate: in rotary wear tests using Rulon LR, an 8 RMS finish produced a wear rating of 1.0, while a 63 RMS finish produced a wear rating of 5.3, more than five times the wear at a rougher finish.
Materials Built for Long Service Life
Rulon: up to 500x the industry wear standard in select grades
Ultracomp: engineered for high-load, high-wear structural applications
TriSteel: metal-backed composite for heavy load, oscillating motion applications
FAQ
Q:What are the main types of bearing wear? +
A: The most common types are abrasive wear, adhesive wear, fatigue wear, and fretting wear. Each has a distinct cause, ranging from contamination and rough shaft finish to insufficient lubrication and vibration.
Q: How much longer do plastic bearings last than metal? +
A: It depends on the application, but self-lubricating composite materials routinely outlast metal and bronze bearings in corrosive, dirty, or poorly lubricated environments, in some cases by a significant margin.
Q: Does shaft finish affect bearing wear? +
A: Yes, substantially. TriStar's own testing found wear rates increasing more than five times between an 8 RMS and a 63 RMS shaft finish.
Q: How is bearing wear tested? +
A: Through tribology testing, which measures friction, wear rate, and transfer film formation under controlled, repeatable conditions.
Chasing premature bearing wear?
Ask a TriStar engineer to evaluate your current material and shaft finish combination.
