Design of Inherently Stable Hydrostatic Bearings

Abstract

Inherently stable bearings have an adequate stiffness because of the pad geometry and therefore require no external control device such as a capillary or orifice flow restrictor. This results in a more economical bearing with less danger of failure due to blockage by dirt in small bore fluid passages. Previous papers have demonstrated three types of suitable bearing pad: the step bearing, the tapered land bearing, and the grooved bearing. This paper gives a comparison between conventional bearings and inherently stable bearings, together with the design data necessary to evaluate the performance of the latter.