Assessment of Galling Wear in Automobile Deep Drawing Dies Using Slider-on-Flat-Surface Wear Test

In this paper, the slider-on-flat-surface (SOFS) test was used to study the galling in automobile body drawing dies (made of GGG60 alloy). The SOFS tests were conducted on the DC06 (EN 10130) and DC04 (MSC standard) alloy sheet metals; according to the following two approaches: in the first approach, the slider was forced to move in a single linear path, repeatedly. While, in the second approach, the slider was moved on separate parallel paths. The second approach was performed using both flat and curved surfaces of the slider to simulate galling conditions on flat and curved surfaces of the dies, respectively. Moreover, the effect of hardness, surface roughness, and mechanical properties of the DC04 and DC06 sheet materials on die galling was investigated. The galling tests’ results were in agreement with the galling wear that occurred in automobile body drawing dies. The results showed that forming DC04 sheet metal will lead to more galling wear. Furthermore, a qualitative coincidence was observed between the results of the aforementioned approaches. Nevertheless, in the first approach, wear emerged in a shorter period; while, in the second approach, the slider was moved on a much longer path for creating observable wear.