Wear of ceramic-on-carbon fiber-reinforced poly-ether ether ketone hip replacements

Total hip replacement has been a successful surgi-cal intervention for over 50 years, with the majority of bear-ings using a polyethylene cup. Long-term failure due toosteolysis and loosening has been widely documented andalternative bearings have been sought. A novel carbon fiber-reinforced poly-ether ether ketone (CFR-PEEK) cup was inves-tigated through experimental friction and wear studies. Fric-tion studies demonstrated the bearings operated in aboundary lubrication condition, with friction factors higherthan those for other hip replacement bearings. The wearstudy was conducted with 36 mm diameter bearings testedagainst Biolox Delta heads for a period of 10 million cycles.The mean volumetric wear rate was 0.3 mm3/Mc, indicatingthe ceramic-on-CFR-PEEK bearing to be a very low wearingoption for total hip replacement.