Friction of polymer/steel gear pairs

Engineering plastics are often applied in tribological systems, where moving parts are subjected to severe friction and wear processes. Compared to metals engineering plastics are used because of their good friction and wear properties together with increased corrosion resistance and vibration damping ability. There are many sorts of technical polymers available of which sliding elements can be produced. To choose proper polymers for a given tribological application is not a simple task owing to many different parameters influencing the performance of a polymer sliding element