Abrasion is a surface breakage event where irregular surfaces of particles are removed. In other words, in milling it is the process which produces sphere like particles by comminuting asperities. Extensive experimental work has been performed to study abrasion events and their process parameters. Very few studies have used the discrete element method (DEM) to study the abrasion behavior of particles. In this regard, this paper reports on using DEM simulation to study the abrasion in a small scale tumbling mill environment. DEM simulations have been carried out for different test mills ranging in diameter from 0.2 m to 1.1 m and all of the mills have 0.2 in length. Each mill has square shaped lifters of 30 mm cross-section. The outcome of the simulation are evaluated to investigate the abrasion and milling parameters, like, force, different energy losses, collision frequency, power consumption. The DEM results are compared with experimental results performed at the JKMRC laboratory. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.