Measurements of lubrication characteristics of a tilting pad thrust bearing disturbed by a water-contaminated lubricant

Abstract

The effect of water contamination on the lubrication has been described in several studies. Water has been defined as a dangerous contaminant which has a very detrimental impact on bearing performance. Nevertheless, many of the previous studies are based on post-accidental analyses, made after the lubrication failure. Thus, these analyses do not take into account all the possible conditions of the presence of water in the oil that can describe the situation. For instance, the case of water-in-oil fine emulsion has never been considered neither the experimental study of the water effect in the case of bearings. Experiments presented in this study were carried out on an eight shoes tilting pad thrust bearing supplied with water-contaminated oil. The contamination rate reached 10% of water by mass while the mixture was a water-in-oil emulsion. Results show that the presence of water is not such detrimental as could have been expected for the cases studied and moreover, that the bearing could have an enhanced behaviour while operating with the presence of water in the oil.

Dynamical Simulations of a Flexible Rotor in Cylindrical Uncavitated and Cavitated Lubricated Journal Bearings

“…in which Equations (10) and (11) have been obtained by imposing the dynamic balance of the centre of the disc C. Equations (12) and (13) have been derived from the dynamic balance of the centre of the Journal J.…”

“…In the last few years, research has demonstrated that the oil whirl occurs when the journal bearing operates with micropolar lubricant [6][7][8][9][10]. For this reason, the effect of the contamination of the lubricants [11] and of non-linear behaviour of film-oil journal bearings in rotating machines have been studied by many authors [12]. Harika et al investigated the effect of water contamination of lubricants on hydrodynamic lubrication and the results show that the viscosity of the lubricant is modified by the presence of water in the lubricating oil.…”

Experimental test of static and dynamic characteristics of tilting-pad thrust bearings

“…Glavatskih and colleagues [3][4][5] developed a thrust bearing test rig, which could measure the film temperature and frictional torque. Harika et al 6 experimentally studied the effect of water contamination on the tilting-pad thrust bearings lubrication. An eight shoes tilting-pad thrust bearing supplied with water-contaminated oil in which the contamination rate reached 10% of water by mass was investigated.…”

“…[1][2][3][4][5][6] Heinrichson and Fuerst 1 performed experimental investigation of the influence of an oil injection pocket on the pressure distribution and oil-film thickness. Measurements of the pressure and oil-film thickness distributions were presented for tilting-pad thrust bearing with surface area of the pad around 100 cm 2 .…”