Adhesive and corrosive wear at microscales in different vapor environments

Sihan SHEN; Yonggang MENG

doi:10.1007/s40544-013-0006-2

Friction 2013, 1(1): 72-80 https://doi.org/10.1007/s40544-013-0006-2

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Open Access | Issue | Published: 26 March 2013

Adhesive and corrosive wear at microscales in different vapor environments

Show Author's Information Hide Author's Information Sihan SHEN, Yonggang MENG^{^*}(

)

State Key Laboratory of Tribology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

Keywords:

adhesive wear, corrosive wear, microelectromechanical systems (MEMS)

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SHEN S, MENG Y. Adhesive and corrosive wear at microscales in different vapor environments. Friction, 2013, 1(1): 72-80. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40544-013-0006-2

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Abstract

Adhesive and corrosive wear at microscales are quantitatively distinguished in lifetime tests of resonant bulk-fabricated silicon microelectromechanical systems (MEMS). By analyzing the oscillation decay characteristics in different vapor environments, we find that wear is dominated by asperity adhesion during the initial stages of rubbing in dry N₂ or O₂/N₂ mixtures; in these situations the transient wear rate is inversely proportional to the wear depth. But in water or ethanol vapors, chemical reactions between the corrosive adsorbed layer and the silicon substrate limit the wear rate to a constant. These observations are consistent with atomic explanations. The differences between adhesive and corrosive wear explain the advantages offered by lubricating with alcohol vapors rather than using dry environments for tribo-MEMS devices. Compared to ethanol, the relatively poor anti-wear effect of water vapor is explained by aggressive and rapid tribo-reactions.

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Adhesive and corrosive wear at microscales in different vapor environments

Show Author's information Hide Author's Information Sihan SHEN, Yonggang MENG^{^*}(

)

State Key Laboratory of Tribology, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China

Abstract

Keywords: adhesive wear, corrosive wear, microelectromechanical systems (MEMS)

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Acknowledgements

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Publication history

Received: 24 December 2012

Revised: 18 February 2013

Accepted: 20 February 2013

Published: 26 March 2013

Issue date: March 2013

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC, Nos. 91123033 and 51021064).

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