Fretting Corrosion Behavior of Tin-plated Electric Connectors with Variation in Temperature

In this study, we conduct fretting corrosion tests on tin-plated brass coupons to investigate the effect of temperature on fretting corrosion for various span amplitudes. We prepare a coupled fretting corrosion specimens using a tin-plated brass coupon with a thickness of $10{\mu}m$. One specimen is a flat coupon and the other specimen is a coupon with a protuberance in 1 mm radius, which is produced using 2 mm diameter steel ball. We conduct fretting corrosion tests at $25^{\circ}C$, $50^{\circ}C$, $75^{\circ}C$, $100^{\circ}C$ by rubbing the coupled coupons together at the contact between the flat and protuberance coupons. We measure electric resistance of the contact during the fretting corrosion test period. There is increase in resistance with fretting cycles. It is found that rate of increase in electric resistance becomes faster with increase in testing temperature. Magnitude of friction coefficient increases with fretting span amplitudes. And, change in friction coefficient becomes desensitized to the increment in span amplitude. Assuming that failure cycle is the cycle with an electric resistance of $0.01{\Omega}$, we find that failure lifetime ($N_f$) decreases with increase in testing temperature. Furthermore, based on the assumption that the damage rate of the connector is inversely related to the failure cycle, we calculate the activation energy for fretting damage to be 13.6 kJ/mole by using the Arrhenius equation. We propose a method to predict failure cycle at different temperatures for span amplitudes below $30{\mu}m$. Friction coefficients generally increase with increase in span amplitude and decrease in testing temperature.

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