Vacuum current-carrying tribological behavior of MoS2-Ti films with different conductivities

Current-carrying sliding is widely applied in aerospace equipment, but it is limited by the poor lubricity of the present materials and the unclear tribological mechanism. This study demonstrated the potential of MoS 2 -based materials with excellent lubricity as space sliding electrical contact materials by doping Ti to improve its conductivity. The tribological behavior of MoS 2 -Ti films under current-carrying sliding in vacuum was studied by establishing a simulation evaluating device. Moreover, the noncurrent-carrying sliding and static current-carrying experiments in vacuum were carried out for comparison to understand the tribological mechanism. In addition to mechanical wear, the current-induced arc erosion and thermal effect take important roles in accelerating the wear. Arc erosion is caused by the accumulation of electric charge, which is related to the conductivity of the film. While the current-thermal effect softens the film, causing strong adhesive wear, and good conductivity and the large contact area are beneficial for minimizing the thermal effect. So the moderate hardness and good conductivity of MoS 2 -Ti film contribute to its excellent current-carrying tribological behavior in vacuum, showing a significant advantage compared with the traditional ones.