The use of water in hydraulics systems allows us to achieve fast responses, minimize pressure loss in hydraulics and most importantly it is extremely environmentaly friendly. The task was to determine which material would be best for the construction of the main components of our water-hydraulic valve. The best choice would increase the working efficiency and extend the life of our valve. The appearance of friction and thus wear were te most important factors in choosing materials. For this reason we conducted several tribological tests during our test. Based on experiments with our tribometer, the coefficients of sliding friction were determined for each of two materials. The wear was analyzed with our optical interferometer. The most suitable pair of materials proved to be polyether-ether-ketone with 30% carbon fibers (PEEK CA30), as it exhibited best mechanical properties. It had the lowest coefficient of sliding friction and wear. However, we also considered the cost of materials. Polyoxymethylene (POM) proved to be the cheaper alternative, as it also had relatively low coefficient of sliding friction and low wear.
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