Lubricant Inertia Effects and Recirculatory Flow in Load-Capacity Optimized Thrust Pad Bearings

Abstract

An analytic investigation into the flow pattern in load-capacity optimized-profile-film thrust bearings is presented. This work shows that recirculatory flow can occur near to the inlet with some film shapes and becomes more extensive as bearing width increases. Of the film profiles investigated, lubricant flow reversal was most, significant in the quadratic type. When compared with linear film, the profile geometries gave enhanced load-carrying ability, but this was accompanied by a decrease in lubricant flowrate and an increase in power consumption. Lubricant inertia effects were most significant for the linear film profile giving increase in load-carying capacity and a decrease in lubricant flow over that where lubricant acceleration was excluded, power losses were affected only marginally.