A finite element analysis (FEA) approach to simulate the coefficient of friction of a brake system starting from material friction characterization

The coefficient of friction (COF) is one of the most important parameters to evaluate the performance of a brake system. To design proper brake systems, it is important to know the COF when estimating the brake force and resulting torque. It is challenging to simulate the COF since friction in disc brakes is a complex phenomenon that depends on several parameters such as sliding velocity, contact pressure, materials, and temperatures, etc. There is a lack of studies found in the literature focusing on simulation of the COF for a full brake system based on tribometer material characterization. The aim of this work is therefore to investigate the possibility to use a finite element analysis (FEA) approach combined with a COF pv-map to compute the global COF of a disc brake system. The local COF is determined from a pv-map for each local sliding velocity and contact pressure determined by the FEA. Knowing the local COF, the braking force of the entire brake system and the global COF can be evaluated. Results obtained by the simulation are compared with dyno bench test of the same brake system to investigate the validity of the simulation approach. Results show that the simulation is perfectly in line with the experimental measurements in terms of in-stop COF development, but slightly higher with a positive offset for every braking.