content has been reported before in our group’s work [7].
The ceramic pullouts of LTO are areally less extensive than
Travan5.
The wear mode for the TiC grains in the head ceramic
material is assumed to be a combination of adhesive
delaminative wear and oxidative wear. Our recent work [17]
has shown that chemical/oxidative wear occurs at the TiC
grains and the pullout particles from the ceramic substrate
are mainly the TiO2 particles with some TiC laminar
particles produced by intra-granular delamination.
The depth of pullout in LTO is less than the depth pullout
of Travan5. It is possible that the lower contact pressure and
subsequent reduction in interface temperature reduces the
rate TiC oxidation. In addition to this, sub-surface stresses
that give rise to the intra-granular delamination in the TiC
are much closer to the surface in the case of LTO system.
This is explained by Sourty et al. [18]. As a consequence of
these effects the number and size of TiO2 particles are less in
the LTO system. The combination of the smaller less
abundant three body wear particles and the lower contact
pressure in the LTO system ensure that the three body
abrasive wear is reduced in LTO, thus producing less depth
of PTR.