A Thermal Elastohydrodynamic Lubricated Thrust Bearing Contact Model

A fully-coupled thermoelastic model for a fixed pad thrust bearing has been developed. Pressure, film thickness and three-dimensional temperature profiles were obtained by simultaneously solving the Reynolds, film thickness, energy and force balance equations using a combined finite difference and finite element method. The elastic deformation due to the pressure and the thermal distortion due to the temperature rise were obtained using finite element method. The results indicate that the thermal effects generally reduce the minimum film thickness and that the temperature rise in the lubricant can be significantly higher than the ambient. Furthermore, the thermal distortion due to the temperature rise has significant effect on the pressure, film thickness and temperature results, while the effect of the elastic deformation due to the pressure is negligible.