Which lubricant works the best?
Lubricants- That was easy!
Which lubricant best reduces torque?
Slippery Sam
8th Grade
Madras Middle School
Mr. Lutz
Acknowledgements
I would like to thanks my dad for helping me do my experiment, gluing the papers to the display board, arranging my written report, and gathering my materials. Without him this project would not be possible.
Abstract
My science fair experiment is to see which lubricant reduces the most amount of torque required to screw in a bolt into a piece of wood. I hypothesize that WD-40 and grease will prove most effective. The purpose of this experiment is to accurately find a lubricant that can improve efficiency of the work force that has the need for drilling items from bolts to screws.
The procedure is very simple and to the point. In summary, first you put on the proper safety equipment. Second, drill holes in a wooden board. Dip the bolts in the lubricant for 2 seconds. Measure amount of torque required to screw in each bolt fully into the wood. Repeat the last 2 steps with all the 7 different lubricants (including control group). That is a summary of the procedure.
My results were as follows: On average, grease was the most effective in lowering torque at 1.18 meter kilograms. The control group was 2.28; that’s more than half the torque! Motor oil (1.42) and vegetable oil (1.45) were close enough that I consider they tied. WD-40 is next with .24 behind vegetable oil. Butter didn’t do nearly as good with a torque of 1.86 meter kilograms and last is wax at 1.94. Grease was most effective because it stayed on the bolt. All the other lubricants were more water based rather then gel like the grease. Since it “stuck” on the bolt better, grease is the best lubricant between the ones tested.
Table of Contents
Hypothesis…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………6
Research…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………7-10
Materials…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………11
Procedure…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………12
Variables and Constants……………………………………………………………………………13
Results………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………14
Analysis……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………15
Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………………………………16-17
Glossary of Terms……………………………………………………………………………………………18
Reference List……………………………………………………………………………………………………19
Hypothesis
If I test which lubricant will best resist torque, then WD-40 and grease will reduce friction the most.
Research
Torque is used in a variety of different ways, such as when you open a door by the turn of a knob and even when people turn up the volume on their computer speakers. The point is torque is used all the time in everyday life. Torque is just something that produces torsion or rotation; the measured ability of a rotating element, as of gear or shaft, or over come turning resistance. Now the torque required to do the tasks mentioned is very minimal, but if the tasks are more strenuous, like tightening the bolts on tires, then it can require more force.
There are two ways to measure torque: the American way, foot pounds, and the Metric unit, newtons. The term foot-pounds may be heard at an automobile repair shop. As previously mentioned, when they increase or decrease the tightness of the tires’ bolts, they (people at an automobile shop) use torque. How do they do this? They use a tool called a torque wrench. The torque wrench is a very helpful tool for them when they tighten the bolts on the tires. Basically, a torque wrench is inserted into a socket that fits the bolts that are being tightened. To work the wrench the motions are up and down in an arc to increase or decrease the foot pounds or newtons. That is how a torque wrench works.
The formula to calculate the measurement of torque is: the distance from the center of the bolt to the outside edge multiplied by the force required to push down on the wrench. For example, if the distance from center of the bolt to the outside edge is one foot, and the force required is one-hundred pounds, then the torque would be one-hundred foot pounds. Those are just a few elements that affect the amount of torque. Rust can also affect the amount of torque. Another way torque can be affected is if you use a lubricant on the bolt. Lubricants are a very important part of reducing the amount of torque required.
When a lubricant is used on something, it is making a surface, like the bolts in car tires, more slippery and smooth. It reduces the friction between two surfaces. There are four main types of lubrication. There’s boundary lubrication, hydrodynamic or full fluid film lubrication, elastohydrodynamic or EHD/ EHL lubrication, and mixed film lubrication. First, boundary lubrication is when the lubricant doesn’t fully cover both surfaces therefore it has highs and lows in performance standards. Second, hydrodynamic or full fluid film lubrication is when both substances are fully separated by the lubricant; they don’t touch. Thirdly, mixed film lubrication is a combination of boundary and hydrodynamic lubrication. Lastly, elastohydrodynamic lubrication is when you apply pressure where the lubricant gives more resistance to a metal surface. Those are the four different types of lubricants.
Lubricant can do many things to help a situation. The first thing to do, as previously mentioned, is they reduce friction. That is an extremely important part to reduce torque. Surprisingly, when people use lubricants it reduces heat. Because it reduces friction, it initially reduces heat as well. Also, lubricants obviously make a substance smoother and slippery which is why friction is reduced. They also help keep out dirt, moisture, and other foreign materials from the two surfaces.
There are a lot of different uses for lubricants in the world. They are used in engines, bearings, gears, pneumatic tools, and most mechanics. A lot of those things create high amounts of friction. Take a machine that builds cars for instance. A mechanical arm grabs the parts every second and moves them back and forth in one direction continuously. That generates a lot of friction. People can use lubricants in those machines to reduce the friction caused by continuous back and forth motions.
There are ingredients in every lubricant. The ingredients in the lubricants affect how well they work. Wax can be a lubricant. Its contents are strands of alcohol and fatty acids. This may or may not make wax a good or bad lubricant. If it does or not, one thing for sure is that ingredients make a big difference in the effectiveness of a lubricant’s torque resistance.
There are a lot of tools people use to calculate the correct amount of torque. Since people need to know how much torque is in newtons, those people need to have a torque calculator to convert the measurements. Those people also need the basic torque wrench. The formula to manually find the amount of torque would also be useful. Those are the tools we would need to correctly calculate the amount of torque.
That is the basic background information on torque and lubricants. To recap, torque is a measure of a rotating element. Torque can be found all around a house. The basic tools people use to calculate torque are a torque wretch, a unit converter, and a basic formula. Lubricants reduce friction between two surfaces. There are four main types of lubricants. They are also used everywhere and can help make tasks a lot easier to accomplish. Lubricants are very helpful and torque is used in your everyday life, all around everything people do.
Materials
1. 3 pieces of 38mm by 89mm by 610mm long wood
2. one bottle (1.41L) of vegetable oil
3. one container (946ml) of Castrol HD motor oil
4. one tub (425g) of Land-O-Lakes butter
5. one spray can (340g) of WD-40
6. one can (453g) Valvoline wheel bearing grease
7. torque wrench
8. drill bits
9. proper work area (table, bar. Place that can get dirty)
10. drill press
11. safety glasses or goggles
12. ear plugs
13. gloves
14. six lubricant containers that can hold enough liquid to submerge the screws
Procedure
1. Wear safety glasses, gloves, and ear plugs.
2. Insert drill bit into the drill press.
3. Drill 9 holes (8mm) approximately 75 millimeters apart into each of the three pieces of wood.
4. Place the piece of wood into the vice.
5. Screw the bolt into the wood until it is at the end of its threads.
6. Attach the socket to the torque wrench.
7. Using a torque wrench, completely screw the bolt into the wood and record the force required.
9. Pour enough vegetable oil in one of the containers to fully submerge a different screw.
10. Dip the screw in the vegetable oil for two seconds.
11. Repeat steps five through nine.
12. Repeat steps ten and eleven with butter, motor oil, WD-40, wax, and grease.
Variables and Constants
Manipulated Variable- Type of Lubricant
Responding Variable- Amount of force required to drill in each bolt
Constants-
1. Type of bolt
2. Temperature of the lubricant
3. Tools that were used
4. Rate at which force is applied to the bolt
5. Size of the hole
Other Variables-
1. We had to use three different pieces of wood
2. The way that the lubricant was applied to the bolt
3. Accuracy was lacking because the increments went by ones instead of going into more accurate decimal points
Results
Analysis
The chart and graph show that grease was the lubricant that using grease required the least amount of torque to screw in the bolt. It made the torque required more than half! That’s one effective lubricant.
As for the others they did alright. The two types of oil were almost the same. Butter and wax were close in numbers as well. WD-40 was in the middle between the oils and the butter and wax.
The individual results were very constant. Thankfully, no outliers occurred and the experiment still ran properly.
Conclusion
My science fair topic is which lubricant would best reduce the amount of torque required to screw in a bolt. The different lubricants that were used are: vegetable oil, motor oil, WD-40, grease, wax, and butter. My hypothesis is that WD-40 and grease would reduce the most torque because those two substances were created to lubricate.
I found out that grease was the most effective in reducing torque. The reason being is because it is a gel-like lubricant. Since it is more like gel, it sticks onto the bolt better. You use more of it then the rest, but it does the best job. One characteristic of a good lubricant is if it stays on the object. The only downside is the grease left a bigger mess than the rest of the lubricants.
Vegetable and motor oil had similar results. It reduced the amount if torque but not as substantially as grease. They are more water based; therefore they seep into the wood rather than stay on the bolt. I was surprised that the motor oil did only .03 meter kilograms better against its vegetable counterpart.
Butter, WD-40, and wax were both lubricants that we had to change the state of matter. The stick of butter had to be turned into a liquid in order to apply it to the bolt. The issue is that the butter was so slippery; it did not stay on the bolt very well. Wax was especially challenging. It has to be melted as well, but it would immediately harden on the bolt. In result, it was easier for it to come off the bolt when it was being screwed in the hole. WD-40 was a spray can. That caused some uneven distribution of the lubricant on the bolt. Those three lubricants required more than anticipated extra treatment.
I would like to know how the substance, glycerin, would compare to grease. It would be a good follow-up experiment idea. Possible errors might have occurred when reading the torque wrench. Also, we didn’t use tools that were designed to give you an exact reading or measurement.
My hypothesis was supported by the results. The scientific principles that were involved were mainly torque and friction. Torque was the basics of the entire experiment. It was the measurement and what was researched the most. Friction also played an important part in the experiment. The purpose of all lubricants is to reduce friction, which causes heat. If there was no friction, there would be no reason to test anything, and the lubricants would have no purpose. That is what I learned in result of my experiment.
Glossary
force- strength or power exerted upon an object; physical coercion; violence
friction- surface resistance to relative motion, as of a body sliding or rolling
lubricants- a substance, as oil or grease, for lessening friction, especially in the working parts of a mechanism
shank- a straight, usually narrow, shaftlike part of various objects connecting two more important or complex parts, as the stem of a pipe
pneumatic tools- include air guns, impact wrenches, nailers, staplers and more
resistance- the act or power of resisting, opposing, or withstanding
rust- any film or coating on metal caused by oxidation
socket- a hollow part or piece for receiving and holding some part or thing
torque - something that produces or tends to produce torsion or rotation; the moment of a forceor system of forces tending to cause rotation
torque wrench- a wrench having a dial or other indicator showing the amount of torque being applied
Reference List
Stein, J. P. (1979). The random house college dictionary. (pp. 1-1568). New York, NY: Random House Inc.
Field, S. Q. F. (2003, July 07). Ingredients--wax. Retrieved from http://sci-toys.com/ingredients/wax.html
Seale, E. (2003, July 9). All about torque. Retrieved from http://bftgu.solarbotics.net/tutorials_mech_torque.html