Effects of bearing orientation on the static performance of micropolar lubricated lobe bearings

Abstract

In contrast to plain circular bearings, orientation of the lobe bearings with respect to a fixed load direction can influence the bearing performance characteristics. Expressing the lobe bearing orientation in terms of an angle, which in this study is referred to as bearing orientation angle, its effect on static performance characteristics of three types of micropolar lubricated lobe bearings is investigated. For this purpose, finite element method is adopted for numerical solution of the modified Reynolds equation. It is found that against the most common mode of the lobe bearing orientation, which is with the bearing orientation angle zero, performance of the lobe bearings can be improved by suitable selection of the bearing orientation angle. Also, lobe bearings with comparatively lesser number of lobes are more affected by the orientation angle.