Four ball friction machine
FBT-3

The DUCOM Four Ball Analyzer (FBT-3) is an automated benchtop device that monitors the load, speed and heat applied to a lubricant. In Fig. Figure 3a shows the three main blocks of the four-ball analyzer. At the bottom there is a load control unit. It consists of pneumatic chambers, a piston and a normal load sensor, they work in tandem to achieve a user-specified load level. The lubricant test area (Fig. 3b) is located in the center of FBT-3. It is a container with balls mounted on an anti-friction pad connected to a loading device. As shown in Fig. 3d, the ball container consists of several components, such as three test balls, a lock nut and a ring, which need to be installed manually. The container with the balls is filled with lubricant, after which testing can begin. The test area has a sliding door to prevent lubricant leakage. It must be closed during the test for the safety of the user. A frameless motor is installed in the upper block, which drives the spindle using a ball collet.

The method of removing a ball from a container and then identifying and measuring the trace of wear on the ball is very inconvenient and is becoming a thing of the past. The DUCOM imaging system is designed to improve user convenience and save time wasted due to manual analysis. As shown in Fig. 3c, this system can completely accommodate a container of beads after EP or WP testing. The patented imaging system allows wear scar detection and a snapshot of the wear scar to be taken on each ball in the container automatically using ScarView 2016 software. Analytical tools in the software help the user quickly measure the diameter and area of the wear scar.

The FBT-3 has 4 important systems. A load cell is used to transmit fluctuations in the applied load during testing. A friction force sensor connected to the ball container transmits the friction force experienced by the lubricant in the container in real time. The thermocouple and heaters in the bead container can heat the lubricant to a user-specified temperature and transmit a temperature curve during testing. The motion sensor can transmit spindle rotation vibrations in real time during the test. The entire sensor system is controlled and its data is displayed/recorded using WinDUCOM software.

• High temperature bead container (ambient temperature 200°C)
• Digital laboratory assistant MOOHA
• Automatic ball wear scar prediction using AI machine learning algorithm (Fig. 4).

Rice. 4. The MOOHA digital assistant allows you to accurately
predict the wear pattern of the test samples.
(A) real image, (B) automatic mask, (C) predicted spot.
Difficulties in visual observation increase the instability of test results.
The MOOHA digital assistant minimizes the influence of the human factor.

WinDUCOM software is used to control the load, speed and temperature applied to the lubricant in the FBT-3. The software architecture eliminates mishandling errors. As shown in Fig. 5, The interface allows the user to select any standards with one click. It will automatically reproduce the test parameters corresponding to the selected standard. The user will ONLY make 5 mouse clicks before starting the EP or WP test according to any testing standards. The screen of the data acquisition system displays the values of friction torque, load, speed and temperature in real time (Fig. 6). Data analysis after the experiment is possible using the data comparison function in the software. This allows the user to compare the results of different tests. Test results can be exported in .CSV, .XLS or .TXT format.