J.F. QUINIOU, Thèse de Doctorat, Besançon (1995)

Summary : The work is based on a functional description of surfaces, with a view to taking a predictive approach to their usage properties, regarding their optical qualities, their ability to be subjected to stamping or surface treatment or wear… The euclidian and fractal geometry have been used to lay the foundation of the descriptive approach to the elementary facets regarded as surface components. The first approach consists in determining a surface equivalent to the sampled one, without keeping the interfacet connexity whose parameters relating to geometry, surface and volume are considered pertinent. The second approach makes use of the non-integer dimension describing the facet hierachy according to the observation scale with some self-affinity or self-similarity relations. Whatever the tool made use of, its numerical validation and its dependency on the measuring tools are quantified. The work, performed on a workstation and based on the concrete realization of a modular rugosimeter by means of tactile and optical sensors, leads on to numerous practical applications in materials science.