Determination of contact area in 'cushion form' bearings for artificial hip joints

Current forms of artificial hip joints produce wear debris, which contributes to loosening of the prostheses. These 'hard' joints articulate with boundary or mixed lubrication, whereas the natural joint articulates with full fluid film lubrication. An artificial joint that articulates with full fluid film lubrication could greatly reduce wear and frictional torque and hence reduce the incidence of loosening and inflammatory tissue reaction. The use of a thin lining of low elastic modulus in the acetabular cup is one possible way of promoting full fluid film lubrication. In the design of such cushion forms of bearings, it is important to be able to predict the contact area, stress distribution and film thickness. This paper presents experimental techniques to determine the contact area in low elastic modulus layers and compares these measured areas with theoretical predictions using linear elasticity theory. At low loads experimental results and theoretical predictions were close. However, at loads above 300 N, the theory overestimated the width of the contact area by up to 8.5 per cent. This difference is mainly attributed to the non-linear behaviour of the elastomer at the higher levels of stress.