Tribological testing and modeling of elastomeric materials

In applications which experience repeated impacts by hard abrasive particles at high or moderate strain rates, elastomers are commonly used. The goal of the current work is to develop a methodology involving scratch testing and modeling which would be simple and cost effective for capturing the failure and wear behavior of elastomeric materials. The high failure strains as well as the extremely good wear resistance of elastomers make this task a formidable challenge. Modeling of a scratch test, however, seems to be promising in this regard.