John: You stated "Friction <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friction> is proportional to (a) the coefficient of friction of the materials and (b) the normal force between the surfaces." It is also proportional to amount of surface contact involved. That's why racers have big tires. It's why pushing a large sanding block on wood is harder than pushing a small block. That's why big trucks have big brake pads. Strings burried into soft iron will have more surface contact and result in more friction than a string touching only at one point. dave ____________________ David M. Porritt, RPT dporritt at smu.edu -----Original Message----- From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of John Delacour Sent: Monday, April 16, 2007 5:39 PM To: College and University Technicians Subject: Re: [CAUT] restrung D At 3:43 pm -0600 16/4/07, Fred Sturm wrote: >...It is conceivable that wear and tear from tuning are greater from >a hard termination than from a softer one, but I wouldn't bet on it. >If the hard termination is more polished and less abrasive (which is >likely), it might well cause less wear. The softer material is >likely to have troughs/grooves, hence greater area in contact with >the string, hence greater friction. That is not so, though the falsehood is oft repeated. Friction <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friction> is proportional to (a) the coefficient of friction of the materials and (b) the normal force between the surfaces. There would be no greater friction if the wire were embedded for half its diameter in a grooved cast-iron bridge than if its surface contacted the bridge for only a tiny fraction of its diameter. No amount of polishing is going to reduce friction. What the effect of cast steel wire rubbing against titanium is I have no idea, and the hardness of the titanium is irrelevant -- what matters is the coefficient of friction -- but friction is low in the case of steel against cast (grey) iron owing to the graphite in the iron. JD
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