A Compact Model for Spherical Rough Contacts

The contact of rough spheres is of high interest in many tribological, thermal, and electrical fundamental analyses. Implementing the existing models is complex and requires iterative numerical solutions. In this paper a new model is presented and a general pressure distribution is proposed that encompasses the entire range of spherical rough contacts including the Hertzian limit. It is shown that the non-dimensional maximum contact pressure is the key parameter that controls the solution. Compact expressions are proposed for calculating the pressure distribution, radius of the contact area, elastic bulk deformation, and the compliance as functions of the governing non-dimensional parameters. The present model shows the same trends as those of the Greenwood and Tripp model. Correlations proposed for the contact radius and the compliance are compared with experimental data collected by others and good agreement is observed.