Hydrostatic bearings with multiport viscous pumps

Abstract

An analysis of multirecess hydrostatic bearings with linear flow-pressure supply characteristics is presented. These characteristics can be obtained using either a constant supply pressure source with a laminar flow restrictor before each recess, or, as suggested in this paper, a multiport viscous pump. Analysis of the viscous pump-bearing system is made for odd numbers of recesses, and it is shown that a staggered or skip-one sequence of connection of the pump ports to the bearing recesses gives the least unbalanced reaction between the pump rotor/stator. The flow-pressure characteristics of viscous pumps with peripheral shrouded Rayleigh steps in a cylindrical configuration are derived and used to design a five-port pump to match a hydrostatic bearing. An experimental pump is designed, manufactured and tested, and the results obtained at one port show good agreement with the theoretically calculated values of pressure and flow. If this port is taken as representative of a pump, which is manufactured with higher accuracy, then the principle of having an effective multiport viscous pump is hereby validated. A simple means is suggested for making the bearing stiffness and load-carrying capacity insensitive to temperature/viscosity changes.