dr hab. inż. Michał Wodtke | Politechnika Gdańska

The ecological aspects of the lubrication of stern tube bearings on ships represent a critical challenge today. Oil leakages are a typical issue, even for new systems, similarly to water ingress from the environment. One of the options for improving environmental protection is replacing mineral oil with an environmentally adaptable lubricant (EAL). This paper reports experimental investigations of the effect of water content in...

In hydrodynamic bearings traditional bearing alloys: Babbitts and bronzes are most frequently utilized. Polymer sliding layers are sometimes applied as a valuable alternative. Hard diamond-like carbon (DLC) coatings, which are also considered for certain applications may show some advantages, as well. Although material selection is of secondary importance in a full film lubrication regime it becomes important in mixed friction...

The purpose of this research is to indicate the potential differences in bearing characteristics resulting from the application of different lubricant types with the same viscosity grade. The effect of different environmentally acceptable lubricants (EALs) on hydrodynamic journal bearing properties is studied experimentally and compared to the properties obtained after lubrication with a reference mineral oil. The results of the...

A journal bearing test bench is used to find the transition speed between the hydrodynamic and mixed lubrication regimes for a modified magnetorheological (MR) fluid. It is shown that the transition speed of the bearing can be reduced by applying a local magnetic field near minimum film when it is lubricated with the MR fluid, and that this will only marginally increase friction. The lubricating performance of the MR fluid is compared...

Abstract: The presented study shows the results of the research into the squeeze film levitation phenomena. The system introduced in the investigation is composed of a vibrating surface, air squeeze film, and the surface of the body freely suspended over the film. The use of the CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) model used in the system allows us to determine the steady state, periodic behavior of the air film (described by Navier–Stokes,...