On the Heavily Loaded Elastohydrodynamic Contacts of Layered Solids

An inlet zone analysis is presented for the elastohydrodynamic lubrication of heavily loaded contacts of layered elastic solids under isothermal and isoviscous conditions. An elastic layer of incompressible elastomeric material (with Poisson’s ratio, ν = 0.50) bonded to a rigid substrate is considered. Numerical results are presented in dimensionless form to describe the variation of nominal film thickness over a wide range of loads, layer thicknesses, and other operating variables.