Heat and Mass Transfer in Confined Lubricated Films

Abstract

Nowadays the accurate prediction of the actual tribological parameters that characterize lubricated systems requires the development of more and more advanced tools. Concerning the numerical ones, this leads to new challenges to model and predict in a proper way the strong couplings between mass (lubricant flow) and heat (dissipation, friction) transfer that appear within and around highly confined lubricating films. This paper presents some recent advances achieved in modeling TEHL problems where shear heating and its consequences can dominate other effects.