A Comparison of Design Methodologies for Journal Bearings under Pulsatile Loads

The paper expands the work by Kinnear and Weston[1] on squeeze film bearing design to the general case and compares the revised methodology with classical bearing design[2,3,4] and hybrid bearing design[5]. The analysis, which employs a partial differentiation of the Poisseuille and Hagen-Poiseuille bearing flow equations, enables a mathematical model for the bearing squeeze film to be developed. This yields a transfer function between bearing displacement and load. Subsequent parameter maps are developed from the transfer function for stiffness and damping coefficients.The method enables hybrid journal bearings under pulsatile load to be considered. Current design methodologies employed do not cater for this situation adequately which limits effective design of these bearings in applications such as in internal combustion engine crankshaft bearings.