Thermal Distortion of an Anisotropic Elastic Half-Plane and its Application in Contact Problems Including Frictional Heating

The thermal surface distortion of an anisotropic elastic half-plane is studied using the extended version of Stroh’s formalism. In general, the curvature of the surface depends both on the local heat flux into the half-plane and the local temperature variation along the surface. However, if the material is orthotropic, the curvature of the surface depends only on the local heat flux into the half-plane. As a direct application, the two-dimensional thermoelastic contact problem of an indenter sliding against an orthotropic half-plane is considered. Two cases, where the indenter has either a flat or a parabolic profile, are studied in detail. Comparisons with other available results in the literature show that the present method is correct and accurate.