Observations of Stick-Slip Friction in Velcro®

Friction, and in particular stick-slip friction, occurs on every length scale, from the movement of atomic force microscope tips at the nanoscale to the movement of tectonic plates of the Earth’s crust. Even with this ubiquity, there still appears to be outstanding fundamental questions, especially on the way that frictional motion varies generally with the mechanical parameters of a system. In this study, the frictional dynamics of the hook-and-loop system of Velcro® in shear is explored by varying the typical parameters of driving velocity, applied load, and apparent contact area. It is demonstrated that in Velcro® both the maximum static frictional force and the average kinetic frictional force vary linearly with apparent contact area (hook number), and moreover, in the kinetic regime, stick-slip dynamics are evident. Surprisingly, the average kinetic friction force is independent of velocity over nearly two-and-a-half orders of magnitude (~2 × 10−4 to ~6 × 10−2 m/s). The frictional force varies as a power law on the applied load with an exponent of 0.28 and 0.24 for the maximum static and kinetic frictional forces, respectively. Furthermore, the evolution of stick-slip friction to more smooth sliding, as controlled by contact area, is demonstrated by both a decrease in the spread of the kinetic friction and the spread of the fluctuations of the average kinetic friction when normalized to the average kinetic friction; these decreases follow power-law behaviors with respect to the increasing contact area with exponents of approximately −0.3 and −0.8, respectively. Lastly, we note that the coefficients of friction μs and μk are not constant with applied load but rather decrease monotonically with power-law behavior with an exponent of nearly −0.8. Phenomenologically, this system exhibits interesting physics whereby in some instances it follows classical Amontons–Coulomb (AC) behavior and in others lies in stark contrast and hopefully will assist in the understanding of the friction behavior in dry surfaces.