For his outstanding contribution to the science of Tribology and its application to practice.
Professor Fujio Hirano was born in Tokyo and graduated in mechanical engineering at Kyushu (Imperial) University. He became a lecturer in 1939, and an associate Professor in 1947. In 1957 he was appointed Professor, in which post he was active until his retirement in 1980. From then, until 1987, he was President of Ohita National College of Technology. At present he is an Honorary Professor of Kyushu University.
After being involved in research in the field of strength of materials and mechanical vibration, since 1947 he has been active in research on wear and lubrication of mechanical elements involving heat transfer, in which spheres his achievements have been wide and outstanding.
Between 1961 and 1965 Professor Hirano established a new method of measuring motion of balls in deep grooved and angular contact bearing, a method which did not interfere with the running conditions of the bearing. By measuring the change of magnetic flux density, caused by a magnetised ball, he succeeded in establishing the three-dimensional motion of the ball in the bearing. This method found many practical applications including in the evaluation performance and safety of bearings used in the Shinkansen trains (the Japanese Bullet Train). It was also used for other high speed applications and helped greatly in the design of the internal geometry of ball bearings, including those for the V2000 jet engines, that are being jointly developed in five countries.
For these investigations, described in a paper to the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers, he was in 1961 awarded that Society’s Award for the Best Paper of that year.
During his research into the sealing mechanism of lip seals (1966-1971), he interpreted the dynamic sealing mechanisms, taking account of the visco-elastic behaviour of the lip and seal surface roughness. For the paper describing this work, Professor Hirano was in 1966 awarded by the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers, for the second time, the Prize for Best Paper of the year.
His research into thermal properties of lubricating oils (1966-1971) added considerably to knowledge of seizure phenomena relative to factors such as the spreading properties of oils on heated surfaces, evaporating characteristics of oils and others. His work established the close connection between thermal properties of oils and their molecular weight distribution. This work was successfully employed in reducing tooth failure of marine reduction gears.
Professor Hirano made significant contributions to the knowledge of the behaviour of oil films between vibrating surfaces and asperity interaction in rolling-sliding contact. He also developed measuring methods for three body abrasive wear and abrasiveness of hard particles attacking exhauster blades, cyclones, and boiler tubes in coal burning steam power generating plants.
In the recent past, Professor Hirano has focused his attention on the effect of heat and mass transfer in oil films and on tribological phenomena, in the area of oil under high pressure, and in the rheological behaviour of polymer solution under elasto-hydro dynamic lubrication conditions.
During the past 10 years, Professor Hirano and his co-workers established the role of the chain matching effect between normal paraffin as a solvent and straight fatty acids as an additive, not only in conditions of boundary lubrication – but also widely on other relevant interfacial phenomena, and their influence upon the transition phenomena, occurring in bulk, and beyond the scope of the interfacial phenomena.
Professor Hirano is regarded as the father of the second generation of tribologists in Japan, where he has established his own successful school of thought in tribology. Many of his former students have distinguished themselves in tribology in both academic and industrial fields.
Professor Hirano is the author or co-author of over 200 publications covering nearly every tribological subject. In addition to the two awards of the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineering Prize, he also won on two occasions, the Major Prize of the Japan Society of Lubrication Engineers, one for the behaviour of oil films between vibration faces, the second on the mechanism of micro-contact of rolling contacts. In 1981, in recognition of his contribution to cultural science through the investigation into, and teaching of tribology, he was awarded the “Nishi-Nihon Bunka Prize” (West Japan Culture Science Prize).
Professor Hirano has been President of the Japan Society of Lubrication Engineers, of which he is now an honorary member, as well as Vice-President of the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers, an Honorary Member of that Society as well as of the Japan Society of Design Engineering. In 1987 the Japanese Government honour Professor Hirano by conferring upon him the Second Order of the Sacred Treasure.
Professor Hirano is indeed a most renowned personality in the field of tribology, who has contributed outstanding work on an international level to the development of the science of tribology and to its industrial application, his work being characterised by his ability to combine fundamental research with applications of that research to engineering practice. He is a worthy recipient of Tribology’s Highest Award: The Tribology Gold Medal for 1987.