Abstract: The contact stress distribution significantly influences the working surface damage． In order to analyze the wear surface damage，the finite element method was used to analyze the evolution process of surface contact stress of three-dimensional slider friction model from static state to sliding state，and comparative study on the plane stress photoelasticity experiments were carried out． By simulation analysis，the distribution of principal stress diffe-rence，contact pressure and frictional stress were obtained． Simulation results show that along with the contact state changes，the contact stresses firstly concentrate on the edges of slider and then concentrate on the front edge of the motion; the influences of load and friction coefficient on contact stresses are significant． The photoelasticity experi-mental results of plane stress field show that the contact stresses is concentrated in front of the movement，which is consistent with the simulation results． The results of abrasion experiment show that when the wear begins，the front edge of the slider shows the biggest damage and the maximum contact stress; as the wear distance increases，the damage of contact surface expands from the front to the back，and finally covers the whole contact surface; the lar-ger load on the contact surface，the higher wear degree．

Key words: abrasion analysis, photoelasticity experiment, contact stress, finite element method