Wear 232 Ž1999.

250–255
www.elsevier.comrlocaterwear

Dynamic characteristics of hydrodynamically lubricated fixed-pad thrust

bearings
Eskild Storteig ) , Maurice F. White
Norwegian UniÕersity of Science and Technology, Department of Marine Engineering, 7034 Trondheim, NTNU, Norway

Abstract

Experiments wN. Mittwollen, T. Hegel, J. Glienicke. Effects of hydrodynamic thrust bearings on lateral shaft vibrations, Journal of
Tribology, 113 ŽOctober 1991. 811–818x have shown that hydrodynamic thrust bearings may influence lateral rotor vibrations
significantly. The purpose of this study was to develop fast computational routines to evaluate the main dynamic coefficients for
hydrodynamically lubricated tapered land bearings, and to use a solution method that could be extended to tilting-pad, and misaligned
bearings. The Reynolds equation for thin film lubrication is solved by using a one-dimensional finite element technique and an assumed
pressure profile in the radial direction. Thermal effects are included by solution of the one-dimensional energy equation using a forward
Euler finite difference technique. Dynamic coefficients are retrieved for fixed pad thrust bearings by numerical differentiation about the
steady state solution. The effects of various geometrical factors, such as pad length-to-width, inner-to-outer radius ratio have been studied.
Results are compared to a two-dimensional perturbation solution and they agree well within the engineering accuracy desired. q 1999
Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Thrust bearings; Dynamic coefficients; Finite elements; Finite differences; Hydrodynamic lubrication

1. Introduction could make the problem one-dimensional and still get a

solution with adequate accuracy for bearing design.
In high speed turbomachinery, the precise knowledge of The tapered land thrust bearing discussed in this study
critical speeds and the margins against self-excited vibra- is described in Fig. 1. Parabolic and constant radial pro-
tions are of great importance. An established way of files were assumed for pressure and temperature, respec-
representing dynamic response characteristics of a hydro- tively.
dynamic fluid film bearing is to use stiffness and damping
coefficients which are assumed linear close to the equilib-
rium position. 2. Theoretical analysis
Mittwollen et al. w6x documented a significant influence
on lateral vibrations from hydrodynamic thrust bearings on 2.1. Reynolds equation and thermal effects
the dynamic characteristics of the total rotor system. The
The partial differential equation which governs hydro-
theoretical results were based on two- and three-dimen-
dynamic lubrication for two-dimensional incompressible
sional solutions of the Reynolds and energy equations,
thin fluid films in the cylindrical coordinate system can be
respectively. There are, however, a number of uncertainties
presented as follows:
regarding boundary conditions. For instance a key parame-
ter like the inlet oil temperature at the leading edge of the 1 E rh3 E p 1 E h3 E p v Eh Eh
pads is hard to calculate accurately, and Vassilopoulos w10x
showed that the thrust pads and their support are flexible
r Er ž Gr
m Er / q
r Eu ž Gu
m r Eu / s
2 Eu
q
Et

and may also significantly influence the total bearing

Ž 1.
dynamic coefficients. Hence, it was assumed that one where: Gu s w2 rnsŽ2 q ms .x ReyŽ1
Ž1qms.
l
qms.
, and
Gr s
w2 yŽ1 qms.
Ž1qms.
rn x Re l . Eq. Ž1. includes turbulence
effects
as suggested by Hirs for predominant Couette flow w4x:
)
Corresponding author. Tel.: q47-7359-5564; fax: q47-7359-5983; with ns s 0.066 and ms s y0.25 for smooth surfaces and
E-mail: eskilds@imm.ntnu.no for the range of Reynolds numbers; 4000 - Re e - 10 5. For

0043-1648r99r$ - see front matter q 1999 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.
PII: S 0 0 4 3 - 1 6 4 8 Ž 9 9 . 0 0 1 5 3 - 2
 E. Storteig, M.F. White r Wear 232 (1999) 250–255 251

Fig. 1. Tapered-land bearing geometry, coordinate systems and coefficient description. Positive u-direction is anti-clockwise.

turbulent transition 2000 - Re e - 4000 the expressions for duce an excitational force in the plane normal to the rotor
Gu and Gr may still be used, but a discontinuity will exist axis. The variation of frictional forces due to an angular
at Re e s 2000 and the uncertainty in results will be greater. velocity about the a and b axes has been assumed
For laminar solutions, Re e - 2000, Gu s Gr s 1r12. The negligible as in Ref. w6x. Then the dynamic coefficient to
local Reynolds number is given by: Re e s rv rp hrm. All be evaluated are: K y b , K x a , K z z , K a a , Kbb , C z z , Ca a ,
results in this paper are based on laminar solutions, al- Cbb Žsee Fig. 1..
though the turbulence correction factors were implemented The desired coefficients were found by numerical dif-
in the simulation program as an option. ferentiation about the static equilibrium solution for the
In Pinkus’ w7x two-dimensional form of the thin film full bearing with Np pads. Perturbations in film thickness
energy equation is given for cylindrical coordinates. Omit- and squeeze film velocity were introduced separately, and
ting radial variations the one-dimensional energy equation the pressure fields were subsequently integrated for all
becomes: pads to yield the desired force vs. perturbation relation-
ships. For axial coefficients a perturbation in film thick-
1 h2 Ep ET
ness of 0.001h min was found suitable, and the perturbation
vr c p h
2
y
12 mv r 2 ž /
Eu Eu velocity was based on this deflection amplitude at syn-
2 chronous vibrations. Similarly for angular perturbations,
mv 2 r 2 h3 Ep
the maximum perturbation amplitudes were set equal to
s
h
q
12 m r 2 ž /
Eu
Ž 2.
the axial perturbations at rp . Although angular coefficients
The viscosity of the fluid was determined by Vogel’s law, will vary around the circumference due to discrete pads, a
m s ae b r T, where T, the temperature, is in Kelvin, and the preliminary study indicated that the variation in stiffness
constants a and b may be derived by solving two simulta- around the circumference was insignificant for bearings
neous equations when the viscosity is known at two differ- with three or more pads of equal spacing. Hence, angular
ent temperatures. perturbation was carried out about the x-axis with up1 s
yupr2.
2.2. Static equilibrium and dynamic coefficients 2.3. Power loss, oil flow rate, and film thickness expres-
sion
Usually the applied thrust force W on the bearing is the
quantity known to the designer, rather than the film thick- The pad power loss, and oil flow rate at a given angle u
ness. Hence a bisection method was used to halve or is given by
3
double the film thickness until restoring forces above and P loss u 2 r b mv r hr E p
below the applied load were found. Then a secant method
iterative procedure was implemented to find the position
v
s H H
u 1 ra ž h
q
2 Eu /
d rd u ,

and
that would yield equilibrium for a given load within a r b rv h h3 E p
tolerance set to 0.001 of the applied load.
The radial forces caused by the tapered land thrust
Qu s Hra ž 2
y
12 m r Eu
dr
/ Ž 3.
bearing due to radial motion of the rotor, are negligible respectively. The expressions were integrated numerically
according to Ref. w6x. However, small angles of tilt will with an assumed radial pressure distribution given in Eq.
produce varying circumferential friction forces, and pro- Ž5. and a calculated angular pressure profile.
252 E. Storteig, M.F. White r Wear 232 (1999) 250–255

A wide range of film thickness expressions for several into Ne equally sized angular segments l, and pressure
types of hydrodynamic thrust bearings are described in boundary conditions are specified at the leading and trail-
Ref. w2x. In this study the following bearing expression is ing edge. For each segment assume; linear pressure varia-
considered for a tapered land thrust bearing. Žsee Fig. 1. tion, constant film thickness, constant turbulence factor.
hŽ r, u . s h min q C wed ŽŽ uw y u .ruw . for u - uw , hŽ r, u . s Then by minimizing the potential function the problem
h min for u G uw . reduces to solving a set of linear equations w B x  Pu 4 s  C 4 .
The matrix w B x is tri-diagonal and has dimensions Ž Ne q 1.
2.4. Numerical implementation = Ž Ne q 1.,  C 4 and  Pu4 are Ž Ne q 1. -dimensional vec-
tors including boundary condition values. When i denotes
Knight and Barret w5x describes in detail the implemen- element number from 1 to Ne the entries of w B x and w C x
tation of a finite element technique used to solve Eq. Ž1. are:
for journal bearings by assuming a pressure distribution in
the axial direction. A similar method for thrust bearings K 1Ž iy1. q K 1Ž i. l
bi ,i s y K 2Ž iy1. q K 2Ž i. ,
was developed in this study and only the main expressions l 3
are presented here.
By using the procedure by Ref. w1x it can be shown that K 1Ž i. l
bi ,iq1 s biq1,i s y y K 2Ž i. Ž 7.
Eq. Ž1. is equivalent to minimizing the potential function: l 6
2 2
u2 rb Gr h 3 Ep Gu h 3 Ep b 11 s bNeq1, Neq1 s 1, b 12 s bNeq1, Ne s 0,
IŽ p. s Hu Hr
1 a
2m ž / Er
q
2mr 2 ž /
Eu
l
ci s K 3Ž iy1. q K 3Ž i. ,c1 s c Neq1 s Psupply Ž 8.
v Eh Eh 2
q ž 2 Eu
q
Et/ p d rd u Ž 4.
The solution method chosen for the linear set of equa-
tions was Gaussian elimination. Cavitation was not consid-
Assuming a parabolic radial pressure distribution:
ered since the film thickness did not diverge for the pads
° rp y r 2 ¶ studied.

p Ž r , u . s~
Pu 1 y
ž rp y ra / , ra F r F rp
• Ž 5.
With a known pressure distribution in the current itera-
tion Eq. Ž2. may be written in an explicit finite difference
2 form where i and i q 1 denote the leading and trailing
r y rp
¢P u 1y
ž r b y rp / , rp F r F r b
ß edge of the corresponding finite element i.
2
piq1 y pi
reduces the potential function to:
2
Tiq1 s Ti q Du C3 q C4 ž Du /
u2 1 d Pu 1
IŽ p. s Hu K1 ž / y K 2 Pu2 y K 3 Pu d u Ž 6. 1 piq1 y pi
2 du 2
1

where K 1 , K 2 and K 3 are constants obtained by integra-

ž C1
2
y C2 ž Du // Ž 9.

tion of Eq. Ž4. in the radial direction. Numerical integra- The constants used C1 to C4 may readily be derived from
tion was chosen for all constants. The pad angle is divided Eq. Ž2.. The leading edge temperature can either be as-

Fig. 2. DIN31653 solution and 1D FE values for total thrust force, power loss and total in-, out- and side flow for the 10 pad bearing, as a function of the
h min rC wed ratio.
 E. Storteig, M.F. White r Wear 232 (1999) 250–255 253

Fig. 3. DIN31653 solution and 1D FE values for inlet-, outlet and effective temperatures, as a function of the h minrC wed ratio for a mixing factor of 0.5
suggested by the standard.

sumed to independent of the trailing edge of the previous
pad, or one may assume some percentage hot oil carry
over. With hot oil carry over an iterative procedure is
needed to determine the leading edge temperature. An
effective viscosity was assumed for each pad and evalu-
ated at Teff s ŽTin q Tout .r2.
3. Results
3.1. Static equilibrium
The German standard w3x was used as the reference for
comparison of results. The assumptions used in the stan-
dard are well documented and similar assumptions were
used for the 1D FE solution. However, w3x results are based
on a two-dimensional solution of the Reynolds equation in
a cartesian coordinate system, and hence, does not report
any dependency of radial position of the pads. In all the
1D FE results reported here a parabolic pressure distribu-
tion was assumed. First a bearing with the following
characteristics was studied: For DIN31653: B s 100 mm,
U s 20 mrs, L s 100 mm. For one-dimensional FE: ra s
200 mm, r b s 300 mm, rp s 255 mm, v s 78.45 radrs,
up s 22.918, up1 s y11.4558, Ne s 40, us s 13.088. Com-
mon values: m s 0.01 Nrm2 s, r s 874.0 kgrm3, c v s
1952.0 JrŽkg K., Mix s 0.5, C wed s variable, h min s 20E
y 6 m, Np s 10, L wed s 0.0, Tsupply s 20.08C.
The mixing factor is defined by DT1 s QoutrŽMix Q q
Ž1 y Mix. Qs .. Where Q is the total flow supplied to the
bearing, and DT1 s Tin y Tsupply . The results are presented
in Figs. 2 and 3.
3.2. Dynamic coefficients
The results of Ref. w6x are based on a two-dimensional
solution of the problem, and they report results at static
equilibrium conditions very similar to those in the DIN
31653. They used a method of finding dynamic coeffi-
cients based on the knowledge of dynamic coefficient of

Fig. 4. Dimesionless dynamic coefficients for a tapered land bearing with length to width ratio of 2.0, and wedge to flat ratio of 0.75, and total dynamic
coefficients, comparison between Ref. w6x and 1D FE.
254 E. Storteig, M.F. White r Wear 232 (1999) 250–255

Table 1 4.2. Length to width and width of pad to outer radius

Case 1 to 3 ratios
Ref. Ratio Ref. Ratio Ref. Ratio
Case1 1DrRef. Case 2 1DrRef. Case 3 1DrRef. The assumed pressure distribution in the radial direction
FU 0.870 1.09 1.489 1.08 2.590 1.15 will be applicable in a limited range of BrL ratios. For the
QUt 0.585 1.10 0.370 0.923 0.233 0.982 BrL s 1 in Fig. 3 the 1D FE solution gives results within
U
Ploss 0.95 1.00 1.13 0.99 1.20 0.995 10% for h minrC wed ratios greater than 1.5, but the results
get rapidly poorer as the minimum film thickness to wedge
ratio becomes smaller than 0.5. It is probable that the loss
one rectangular pad only. They assume that the number of of accuracy for small h minrC wed ratios is mainly due to
pads is large so that a distributed stiffness and damping the parabolic pressure assumption. The same trend was
will be valid. Results in this section are compared to the found for power loss and volume flow rates for BrL s 0.5
reference using the following input–output parameters: for the case studied in Fig. 4.
Dimensionless coefficients for single pads: k Uz z s The results in Table 1 indicate that the different width
k z z h 3min rŽ BL2 Um eff ., cUz z s c z z UrL P h 3min rŽ BL2 Um eff ., of pad to outer radius ratios solution do not alter the
L wedrL pad s 0.75, BrL s 0.5 Input for one-dimensional accuracy of solution significantly.
FE: ra s 200 mm, r b s 250 mm, rp s 226 mm, v s 88.34
radrs, up s 25.318, up1 s y12.6558, Ne s 40, Np s 10, us 4.3. Dynamic coefficients
s 10.698, meff s 0.01 Nrm2 s. The results for single pad
characteristics in non-dimensional form and total dimen- Fig. 4 shows that the 1D FE results are within "7% of
sional coefficients are shown in Fig. 4. the two-dimensional reference solution for the whole range
of h minrC wed ratios. This indicates that the dynamic coef-
3.3. Width of pad to outer radius ratio ficients are much less sensitive to the choice of pressure
profile than power loss and volume flow rate.
Sawyer w8x has tabulated dimensionless values for radial Since the 1D FE program includes all discrete pads of
volume flow rate, thrust force and power loss as a function the bearing it does not need to use the assumption of
of bearing width to outer radius and minimum film thick- evenly distributed coefficients like Ref. w6x. However, the
ness to wedge ratio. The tabulated values are based on a results indicate that the assumption is valid for the bearing
two-dimensional Reynolds equation solution in polar coor- studied.
dinates. In the comparison below the following parameters The computational time required per solution when the
are used: F U s m NrP ŽŽ r b y ra .rC wed . 2 , QUr s Q rr runner was fixed axially was a fraction of a second on an
U
Žp r b N Ž r b y ra .C wed ., P s nominal pad pressure, Ploss s HP780 workstation and the number of iterations to achieve
static equilibrium when the load was specified was typi-
Ž 2 4.
(
2 2
Ploss C wedr pm N r b , rp s Ž ra q r b . r2 , h min s 20 =
cally less than 10 even if the initial film thickness assump-
10y6 m, L wedrL pad s 1, U s 20 mrs Žat rp ., Np s 10,
tion was off by several orders of magnitude.
m s 0.1 Pa s, h minrC wed s 1, up s 308 results for three
different pairs of pad radii, Case 1: ra s 0.2 m, r b s 0.3 m,
Case 2: ra s 0.1 m, r b s 0.2 m, Case 3: ra s 0.1 m, 5. Conclusions
r b s 0.3 m, respectively are shown in Table 1
For tapered land bearings the one-dimensional solution
of the Reynolds equation for thin film lubrication with a
4. Discussion given effective viscosity gave results for power loss and
volume flow rates at static equilibrium that compared
4.1. Thermal effects reasonably well with two dimensional solutions for a range
of pad length to width- and minimum film thickness to
Fig. 3 indicates that the temperature rise over a given wedge height ratios. The dynamic coefficients which were
pad is predicted 2.5–58C above the w3x results for a fixed the main goal of this study were found to be less sensitive
effective viscosity. This is probably mainly due to the to the reduction from two to one-dimensional solution than
assumption of no temperature variation in the radial direc- power loss and volume flow rates. Hence, there was very
tion. Since some of the hot oil that exists at the trailing good agreement Ž"7%. in results for all dynamic coeffi-
edge of one pad will carry over to the next, the input cients compared to other published results. The fast calcu-
temperature will generally not be known. The approach lation of coefficients indicated that the it would be feasible
adopted in Ref. w3x with a mixing factor has shown to give to incorporate the program in transient rotor-dynamics
reasonable results relative to experiments. This approach calculations where the coefficients may vary with time.
was also used for the 1D FE solution and Fig. 3 indicates The method chosen can be extended to deal with mis-
that the effective temperature is strongly influenced by hot aligned bearings, and a solution for tilting-pads is accepted
oil carry over at the higher h minrC wed ratios. for publication w9x.
 E. Storteig, M.F. White r Wear 232 (1999) 250–255
6. Nomenclature
a, b Runner rotation angle around x- and
y-axis, respectively
a, b, B, C wed Vogel’s first, and second coeffi -
cient, width of pad, pad wedge
height
c m n , Cm n Pad- and bearing damping coeffi -
cients with direction indexes m, n
C1 , C 2 , C 3 Constants used in Eq. Ž8.. They are
given implicitly from Eq. Ž2.
cÕ , cp , E Specific heat at constant volume,
and constant pressure, partial differ-
entiation
F, Gu , Gr Force, turbulence coefficient for
angular, and radial direction
h, h min Hydrodynamic-, and minimum oil
film thickness
kmn, K mn Pad- and bearing stiffness coeffi -
cients with direction indexes m, n
K 1, K 2 , K 3 Constants used in Eqs. Ž6. – Ž8..
They are found by radial integration
of Eq. Ž4.
l, L, L wed Length of finite elementss uprNe ,
length of pad and wedge length
along rp
m, n Direction indexes x, y, z, a , b
Mix Mixing factor for hot oil carry over
m , meff Dynamic viscosity, and effective
dynamic viscosity
ms, ns Constants used for bulk flow turbu-
lence modeling, ms s y0.25, ns s
0.066
N, Np , Ne Rotational speed ŽHz., number of
pads and number of elements
v , p, Ploss Rotational speed Žradrs., pressure,
pad power loss
Q in , Qout , Qs Volume flow rate into pad leading
edge, out of pad trailing edge and
side flow
r, ra , r b , rp Radial coordinate, inner-, outer
radius of pad, radius of maximum
pressure
255
r , Re l Density, local Reynolds number at
rp and h
u , u 1 , u 2 , us Angular coordinate, angle at lead -
ing- and trailing pad edge, angle
between pads
up , uw , up1 , t Pad angle, wedge angle, and pad 1
leading edge angle, time
T, Tin , Tout , DT Temperature, leading- and trailing
edge temperatures, change in tem-
perature
U, W Relative velocity difference between
the lubricating surfaces, applied ax-
ial load
x, y, z,U Cartesian coordinates, superscript
for dimensionless variables
References
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lubrication: an engineering approach. Journal of Lubrication Tech-
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w2x Theodore S. Brockett, Thermoelastohydrodynamic lubrication in
thrust bearings, PhD dissertation, University of Virginia, Department
of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, January 1995.
w3x DIN31653. Deutsche norm, Berechnung von Axialsegmentlagern.
Teil 1–2, May 1991. Hydrodynamische Axial-Gleitlager im station-
aren Betrieb.
w4x G.G. Hirs. A bulk-flow theory for turbulence in lubricant films.
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w5x J.D. Knight, L.E. Barrett, An approximate solution technique for
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w6x N. Mittwollen, T. Hegel, J. Glienicke, Effects of hydrodynamic
thrust bearings on lateral shaft vibrations, Journal of Tribology 113
Ž1991. 811–818.
w7x O. Pinkus. Thermal Aspects of Fluid Film Tribology. Library of
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pp.
w10x L. Vassilopoulos, Methods for computing stiffness and damping
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