Transition from Static to Dynamic Friction in an Array of Frictional Disks

Abstract

The nature of an instability that controls the transition from static to dynamical friction is studied in the the context of an array of frictional disks that are pressed from above on a substrate. In this case the forces are all explicit and Newtonian dynamics can be employed without any phenomenological assumptions. We show that an oscillatory instability that had been discovered recently is responsible for the transition, allowing individual disks to spontaneously reach the Coulomb limit and slide with dynamic friction. The transparency of the model allows a full understanding of the phenomenon, including the speeds of the waves that travel from the trailing to the leading edge and vice versa.

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Cited by in corpus (3)

• Giant Amplification of Small Perturbations in Frictional Amorphous Solid
• A model of friction with plastic contact nudging: Amontons-Coulomb laws, aging of static friction, and non-monotonic Stribeck curves with finite quasistatic limit
• Oscillatory Instabilities in 3-Dimensional Frictional Granular Matter