define frictional force.

the friction is the opposition to relative motion when two surfaces in contact  move or tend to ove on one another

tend to move

sreelakshmi,i also think it will produce the same amount of force opposing the object,upto some level.!!!

 The definition of friction as "the force that resists motion when the surface of one object comes into contact with the surface of another" does not exactly identify what it is. Rather, the statement describes the manifestation of friction in terms of how other objects respond. A less sophisticated version of such a definition would explain electricity, for instance, as "the force that runs electrical appliances." The reason why friction cannot be more firmly identified is simple: physicists do not fully understand what it is.

Much the same could be said of force, defined by Sir Isaac Newton's (1642-1727) second law of motion as the product of mass multiplied acceleration. The fact is that force is so fundamental that it defies full explanation, except in terms of the elements that compose it, and compared to force, friction is relatively easy to identify. In fact, friction plays a part in the total force that must be opposed in order for movement to take place in many situations. So, too, does gravity—and gravity, unlike force itself, is much easier to explain. Since gravity plays a role in friction, it is worthwhile to review its essentials.

Newton's first law of motion identifies inertia, a tendency of objects in the physical universe that is sometimes mistaken for friction. When an object is in motion or at rest, the first law states, it will remain in that state at a constant velocity (which is zero for an object at rest) unless or until an outside force acts on it. This tendency to remain in a given state of motion is inertia.

Inertia is not a force: on the contrary, a very small quantity of force may accelerate an object, thus overcoming its inertia. Inertia is, however, a component of force, since mass is a measure of inertia. In the case of gravitational force, mass is multiplied by the acceleration due to gravity, which is equal to 32 ft (9.8 m)/sec². People in everyday life are familiar with another term for gravitational force: weight.

Weight, in turn, is an all-important factor in friction, as revealed in the three laws governing the friction between an object at rest and the surface on which it sits. According to the first of these, friction is proportional to the weight of the object. The second law states that friction is not determined by the surface area of the object—that is, the area that touches the surface on which the object rests. In fact, the contact area between object and surface is a dependant variable, a function of weight.

The second law might seem obvious if one were thinking of a relatively elastic object—say, a garbage bag filled with newspapers sitting on the finished concrete floor of a garage. Clearly as more newspapers are added, thus increasing the weight, its surface area would increase as well. But what if one were to compare a large cardboard box (the kind, for instance, in which televisions or computers are shipped) with an ordinary concrete block of the type used in foundations for residential construction? Obviously, the block has more friction against the concrete floor; but at the same time, it is clear that despite its greater weight, the block has less surface area than the box. How can this be?

The answer is that "surface area" is quite literally more than meets the eye. Friction itself occurs at a level invisible to the naked eye, and involves the adhesive forces between molecules on surfaces pushed together by the force of weight. This is similar to the manner in which, when viewed through a high-powered lens, two complementary patches of Velcro™ are revealed as a forest of hooks on the one hand, and a sea of loops on the other.

On a much more intensified level, that of molecular structure, the surfaces of objects appear as mountains and valleys. Nothing, in fact, is smooth when viewed on this scale, and hence, from a molecular perspective, it becomes clear that two objects in contact actually touch one another only in places. An increase of weight, however, begins pushing objects together, causing an increase in the actual—that is, the molecular—area of contact. Hence area of contact is proportional to weight.

Just as the second law regarding friction states that surface area does not determine friction (but rather, weight determines surface area), the third law holds that friction is independent of the speed at which an object is moving along a surface—provided that speed is not zero. The reason for this provision is that an object with no speed (that is, one standing perfectly still) is subject to the most powerful form of friction, static friction.

The latter is the friction that an object at rest must overcome to be set in motion; however, this should not be confused with inertia, which is relatively easy to overcome through the use of force. Inertia, in fact, is far less complicated than static friction, involving only mass rather than weight. Nor is inertia affected by the composition of the materials touching one another.

As stated earlier, friction is proportional to weight, which suggests that another factor is involved. And indeed there is another factor, known as coefficient of friction. The latter, designated by the Greek letter mu (μ), is constant for any two types of surface in contact with one another, and provides a means of comparing the friction between them to that between other surfaces. For instance, the coefficient of static friction for wood on wood is 0.5; but for metal on metal with lubrication in between, it is only 0.03. A rubber tire on dry concrete yields the highest coefficient of static friction, 1.0, which is desirable in that particular situation.

Coefficients are much lower for the second type of friction, sliding friction, the frictional resistance experienced by a body in motion. Whereas the earlier figures measured the relative resistance to putting certain objects into motion, the sliding-friction coefficient indicates the relative resistance against those objects once they are moving. To use the same materials mentioned above, the coefficient of sliding friction for wood on wood is 0.3; for two lubricated metals 0.03 (no change); and for a rubber tire on dry concrete 0.7.

Finally, there is a third variety of friction, one in which coefficients are so low as to be negligible: rolling friction, or the frictional resistance that a wheeled object experiences when it rolls over a relatively smooth, flat surface. In ideal circumstances, in fact, there would be absolutely no resistance between a wheel and a road. However, there exists no ideal—that is, perfectly rigid—wheel or road; both objects "give" in response to the other, the wheel by flattening somewhat and the road by experiencing indentation.

Up to this point, coefficients of friction have been discussed purely in comparative terms, but in fact, they serve a function in computing frictional force—that is, the force that must be overcome toset an object in motion, or to keep it in motion. Frictional force is equal to the coefficient of friction multiplied by normal force—that is, the perpendicular force that one object or surface exerts on another. On a horizontal plane, normal force is equal to gravity and hence weight. In this equation, the coefficient of friction establishes a limit tofrictional force: in order to move an object in a given situation, one must exert a force in excess of the frictional force that keeps it from moving.