Erosion of polymers and polymer composites surfaces by particles

Surface erosion due to solid particle impact is a major concern in engineering applications of handling solid-particulate flow. A semi-empirical model is developed for numerical erosion simulation of polymers and polymer composites. The novelty of the developed model is the correct capturing of the angle of maximum erosion for different erosion modes of polymeric materials and relating it to measurable mechanical properties of the target materials. The model incorporates both the material removal due to elastic–plastic collision of the particles at oblique and normal impact angles. The oblique impact model is derived for ploughing and fracture governed mechanisms of material removal. A simplified correlation is used to consider the relative effect of each mechanism on the total erosion at oblique impact angles. The model indicates the variation in velocity exponent to the mechanism of material removal. The theoretically derived model for single-particle impact is correlated to the available experimental results of multi-particle impacts through the empirical coefficients. The predictions are in good agreement with the extensive literature data for polymers and polymer composites. Further, to propose a single model of erosion for polymer and its composite, the relationship between the empirical coefficients in the developed model and the target material properties is established.