Development of a new analyzing model for quantifying pedestrian slip resistance characteristics: part II-Experiments and validations [An article from: International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics]

This digital document is a journal article from International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, published by Elsevier in 2004. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Description:
In a companion paper (Development of a new analyzing model for quantifying pedestrian slip resistance characteristics: Part I. Theory and evaluation), a new tribology model capable of quantifying the surface interactions and wear evolutions between shoes and floors was presented. In the current paper, the model is used to analyze the surface interlocking mechanisms and wear developments between the shoe heels and floor surfaces by two groups of dynamic friction tests. The tests are conducted between three shoes and two different types of flooring specimens with similar range of roughness scales. The overall experimental results show that the comparative surface harmony was well correlated with the slip resistance results so that the calculated indices between each shoe and floor seem to be good estimators to predict the interfacial slip resistance properties. Several inter-related mechanisms such as material transfer and film formation were also found to be factors in the shoe-floor friction and wear phenomena. Three-dimensional microscopic observations clearly show that each shoe and flooring specimen had experienced various types of surface alterations and surface failures that were evolved throughout the entire tests. Wear patterns of each shoe depended on the particular combination of the shoe material and floor geometry. Overall wear modes of each flooring specimen show severe material transfers and film formations from an early stage of rubbings. From this experimental study, it becomes clear that the new measuring concept for the surface analysis shows a good correlation among the surface arguments, wear effects and slip resistance results. This agreement is encouraging for the search of a more reliable method than a simple friction measurement. Accounting for the effect of diverse walking conditions would be expected to improve the results. Relevance to industry: This study suggests a sound theoretical foundation for the understanding of frictional and wear mechanisms between shoe and floor surfaces. On a broader scale, this study may also assist the improvement of design aspects of both footwear and floor surfaces that consequently lead to reduction in the slip hazards.