Design of Hydrodynamically Lubricated a New Micro-pocketed Tilting Pad Thrust Bearing Based on Simulated Performance Parameters

Abstract

Numerical investigation has been performed at several operating parameters for developing the graphs to design a hydrodynamically lubricated new micro-pocketed tilting pad thrust bearing. The performance parameters (minimum film thickness, friction coefficient, inflow, side leakage, and dynamic coefficients i.e., stiffness and damping) with new micro-pocketed pad have been plotted as a function of pivot location. The use of these graphs has been demonstrated by presenting a solved design problem. The performance parameters of bearings achieved with the new micro-pocketed pad have been compared with plain and rectangular micro-pocketed pads at wide range of operating parameters. With the new micro-pocketed pad, up to 37.4% & 7.7% increase in the minimum film thickness and 14.3% & 7% reduction in friction coefficient have been found compared to the plain and existing rectangular shape pocketed pads, respectively.

Keywords

• thrust bearings
• tilting pad
• micro-pockets
• numerical simulations
• bearing design