By Jim Fitch
Practicing Oil Analysis Magazine
This isn’t your usual article on how important clean oil is to lubricant health and machine reliability. Yes, we are going to talk about particle contamination, but we’re going to take a much closer look at the destructive traits of this nearly invisible material that cohabitates with our lubricants.
As it turns out, there is a lot more to particles than their size and count. This column will peer into the intricacies of the physical and chemical properties that make up and characterize solid particle contamination.
I’ll begin by discussing 10 particle characteristics that should be important to lubricant analysts and lubrication professionals. Each of these characteristics or traits influences the health of lubricated machinery. While the name of the trait may be familiar, the damage it causes may not be.