Authors : Elena Parovay and Sergei Falaleev
Abstract: The research investigates the peculiarities of the numerical study of low-flow tilting-pad journal bearings. The low-flow nature of these bearings comes from their operation under oil starvation with a close radial clearance. The study describes the structural features, the mechanism and the design of low-flow journal bearings. The features of these bearings are their resistance to self-oscillation, high performance, efficiency and load bearing capacity. The efficiency of mounting groups in modern turbomachines including journal bearings, largely depends on their design technology. The purpose of this research is to study numerically the characteristics of low-flow tilting-pad bearings under oil starvation. The known technique for determining the characteristics of tilting-pad bearings was chosen as the prototype. This technique was modified for the conditions of oil starvation. The modified technique was used to carry out a series of computations and to determine the dependencies of the performance of the bearing on the load, rotational speed of the shaft and the size of the radial clearance. Obtained dependencies matched the usual characteristics of tilting-pad journal bearings. A 2-phase model of a low-flow tilting-pad journal bearing was designed with regard to the effect of lubricant adhesion, surface roughness, inertia and the presence of a free boundary between the liquid and gaseous phase.
Elena Parovay and Sergei Falaleev, 2017. Low-Flow Tilting-Pad Hydrodynamic Bearings with an Elastic Support of Pads. Mechanism and Theoretical Approaches. Journal of Engineering and Applied Sciences, 12: 8959-8967.