Why Does Carbide Button Wear and Tear?

Any product will fail under long-term operation, and carbide button are no exception. Let's take a look at the reasons why carbide mining button lose their effectiveness through abrasive grain wear.

During rock drilling, the rock is shattered by violent impact in order to drill holes in the rock. During this process, the alloy teeth must collide and rub against the rock and inevitably wear. Wear is a normal failure of alloy teeth when they do not break. Due to the wear caused by the collision and friction between the alloy teeth and the rock, it is no longer possible to use the drilled rock. Hard particles in the rock are first ploughed into the softer bonded phase portion of the alloy tooth and are preferentially ground away. During the subsequent cutting motion, the WC grains, which have lost the protection of the bonded phase, are further stripped away, thus grinding away a small part of the alloy tooth. The wear of the alloy teeth is accelerated by the increasing relative movement and contact area between the alloy and the rock due to the constant wear of the alloy teeth under the loading of the rock drill. The higher the speed of the relative movement of the tungsten carbide button to the rock, the larger the contact area and the greater the propulsive pressure of the rock drill machinery, the faster the wear. The normal wear surface is a smooth surface resembling a flat surface, but when the alloy is low in hardness and the rock is hard, the wear surface will show some visible signs of wear. Generally speaking, the wear and stresses on the middle and side teeth are different. The higher the linear velocity of the tooth or teeth close to the edge in operation, the greater the relative friction with the rock and the more severe the wear.

Wear failure is inevitable, but the possibility of failure can be minimised by purchasing good quality carbide button.