Parametric Study on a Wavy-Tilt-Dam Mechanical Face Seal in Reactor Coolant Pumps

Abstract

The reliability of mechanical seals in reactor coolant pumps is essential for the safety of pressurized water nuclear power plants. A wavy-tilt-dam (WTD) mechanical face seal, characterized by a circumferential wave with a radial taper and seal dam on one of the seal faces, has proved to be effective in practice. A theoretical model is developed to study the mechanism of the WTD seal in this article. Then, the structural parameters such as wave amplitude, taper, dam radius, and the number of waves are studied for the WTD seal under different rotation speeds and seal pressures. The results show that the mechanism of the WTD seal is the combination of hydrodynamic and hydrostatic effects, which do not work simultaneously. During the period of start-up and shutdown, when the film thickness and the pressure differential are both small, the seal works as a hydrodynamic seal, whereas it is a nearly hydrostatic seal at the stable working condition. The waves on the seal face will obviously impair the hydrostatic effect before cavitation occurs in the fluid film. The optimal values of the structure are obtained by analyzing the numerical results under certain working conditions. In addition, the performance varies obviously with rotation speed and seal pressure.

KEY WORDS:

• Mechanical Seals
• Wave
• Wavy-Tilt-Dam
• Hydrodynamic Effect
• Hydrostatic Effect
• Reactor Coolant Pump

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work was supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (973) (Grant No. 2009CB724304), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 50975157) and the Key Research Program of the State Key Laboratory of Tribology of Tsinghua University (Grant No. SKLT08A06).

Review led by Richard Salant