Antoine Chateauminois, 1 Mohamed Kharrat, 2 and Abdelkader Krichen 2 Analysis of Fretting Damage in Polymers by Means of Fretting Maps ______________________________________________________________________ REFERENCE: Chateauminois, A., Kharrat, M., Krichen, A., "Analysis of Fretting Damage in Polymers by Means of Fretting Maps," Fretting Fatigue: Current Technology and Practices, ASTM STP 1367, D.W. Hoeppner, V. Chandrasekaran, and C.B. Elliott, Eds., American Society for Testing and Materials, West Conshohocken, PA, 1999. ABSTRACT: The features of the fretting-wear behavior of glassy polymers against rigid counterfaces are reviewed through fretting maps concepts. The suitability of an elastic analysis to describe the fretting conditions in Running Condition Fretting Maps is discussed on the basis of numerical and experimental investigations of the contact zone kinematics. Material response in terms of cracking is subsequently analyzed in relation to the contact loading and to the plain fatigue properties of the polymer. KEYWORDS: PMMA, epoxy , fretting-wear, cracking, particle detachment Nomenclature a Radius of the contact area (sphere-flat), Semi-width of the contact (cylinder-flat) G Shear modulus h Maximum crack depth N, N i Number of cycles, Number of cycles for crack initiation P Normal load p m Mean contact pressure x o Tangential displacement of the center of the contact area Q,Q* Tangential load, maximum tangential load δ,δ*, δ t Relative displacement, displacement amplitude, critical displacement amplitude at the transition from Partial Slip (PS) to Gross Slip (GS) condition ν Poisson's ratio μ Coefficient of friction (COF) σ xx Maximum value of the tensile stress at the edge of the contact 1 Research Fellow, Laboratoire IFoS, UMR 5621, Ecole Centrale de Lyon, Ecully 69131, France. 2 Lecturers, Laboratoire LPMM, Ecole Nationale d'Ingénieurs de Sfax, Sfax 3038, Tunisia.