Study on the Abrasive Wear in a Ball Type Joint of Automotive Drive Shaft

Ball type joint is one of key component of automotive drive shaft, which is used in a front drive transmission vehicle for transmitting rotary movement from the gearbox output shaft to the wheels with a constant velocity. It has been found that the ball type joint is usually failure caused by abrasive wear. This paper is dedicated to analyze the abrasive wear by theoretical investigation on the relatively slipping velocity of each component of the ball joint, as well as the experimental approach. The results show that the grading of abrasive wear of the components is largely depended on the relatively slipping velocity.