Feature

On the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous

journal bearings with couple stress uids
N.B. Naduvinamani
Department of Mathematics, Gulbarga University, Gulbarga, India
P.S. Hiremath
Department of Computer Science, Gulbarga University, Gulbarga, India, and
Syeda Tasneem Fathima
Department of Mathematics, Bellary Engineering College, Bellary, India
Abstract
Purpose This paper aims to advance the squeeze lm characteristics of long partial journal bearings with couple stress uid studied by Lin to include
the effect of permeability on the squeeze lm lubrication of long partial porous journal bearings with couple stress uids.
Design/methodology/approach A semi-analytical and semi-numerical solution for the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous partial journal
bearings lubricated with couple stress uid is presented in the paper. The modied Reynolds equation governing the uid lm pressure is derived. The
modied Reynolds equation is solved analytically and closed form expressions for the squeeze lm pressure and load carrying capacity are presented.
The rst-order non-linear equation for the time-height relation is solved numerically with the given initial condition. The effect of couple stresses and
permeability on the squeeze lm characteristics are discussed.
Findings It is found that the effect of couple stresses is to increase the load carrying capacity and to lengthen the squeeze lm time as compared to
the corresponding Newtonian case. The effect of permeability is to reduce the load carrying capacity and to decrease the squeeze lm time as compared
to the corresponding solid case.
Originality/value In the design of porous partial journal bearings, the reduction in the load carrying capacity and the response time can be
compensated by the use of lubricants with proper microstructures by which the bearing life can be increased.
Keywords Lubrication, Fluids
Paper type Research paper
Nomenclature
C radial clearance
e eccentricity
h uid lm thickness, h C 2 e cos u

h non-dimensional lm thickness,
h=C 1 21 cos u

h
0
non-dimensional minimum lm thickness,
h
0
=C 1 21
H
0
thickness of the porous layer
l characteristic material length of the suspended
particles (h/m)
1/2

l couple stress parameter, l/C

p pressure in the lm region
p pressure in the porous region
p non-dimensional pressure pC
2
=mR
2
d1=dt
R radius of the journal
t response time taken by journal centre to move from
1 0 to 1
1
u,v uid velocity components in the x, and y directions,
respectively
u,v uid velocity components in the x and y directions,
respectively, in the porous region.
W load carrying capacity per unit length of the
bearing

W non-dimensional load capacity WC

2
=mR
3
d1=dt
x,y local Cartesian co-ordinates
b ratio of microstructure size to pore size h=m=k
h material constant responsible for couple stress
property
u circumferential co-ordinate
1 eccentricity ratio, e/C
m lubricant viscosity
t dimensionless response time WC
2
t=mR
3

c permeability parameter kH
0
=C
3

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Industrial Lubrication and Tribology
57/1 (2005) 1220
q Emerald Group Publishing Limited [ISSN 0036-8792]
[DOI 10.1108/00368790510575941]
The authors acknowledge the nancial support under the Special
Assistance Program DRS project by the University Grants Commission,
New Delhi, India.
12
Introduction
Self-lubricating porous bearings have the advantage of
reducing the need for certain lubricating equipments (oil
pipes, pumps, etc.) as well as reducing other problems related
to lubrication mechanism. One of the advantageous feature of
the porous bearings is that, no external supply of lubricant is
required for running-in. It was Morgan and Cameron (1957)
who rst gave an analytical survey of study of porous bearings
with the aid of hydrodynamic conditions. There have been
numerous studies of various types of porous bearings, such as
slider bearings (Uma, 1977), journal bearings (Prakash and
Vij, 1974), squeeze lms (Wu, 1971) and thrust bearings
(Gupta and Kapur, 1979).
Many of the studies on porous bearings are conned to
Newtonian lubricants. But the use of non-Newtonian uids as
lubricants is of growing interest in recent times. In particular,
the addition of long chain polymer solutions to the lubricant
enhances the bearing performance. These lubricants are uids
with microstructures. The failure of the classical continuum
theory in representing the ow behaviour of such uids
adequately has led to the development of the microcontinuum
theories (Ariman et al., 1973, 1974). One of these theories is
couple stress theory proposed by Stokes (1966), which
account for the polar effects due to the presence of
microstructures in the uid. The Stokes couple stress
model describes adequately the rheological behaviour of the
lubricants with polymer additives. Many of the investigations
for the study of performance characteristics of various bearing
systems with couple stress uid are found in the literature.
The studies by Ramaniah (1979), Ramaniah and Sarkar
(1978), Bujurke and Jayaraman (1982), Bujurke and
Naduvinamani (1990), Lin (1997a b) have shown that the
effect of couple stresses is to increase the load-carrying
capacity and the response time of approach in the squeeze
lms.
Recently, Naduvinamani et al. (2001) have studied the
effect of couple stresses on the squeeze lm lubrication of
short porous journal bearings and conrmed the earlier
ndings of increased load-carrying capacity and delayed time
of approach. In the present study, the squeeze lm
characteristics of long partial journal bearings with
couplestress uid studied by Lin (1997a b) has been
advanced to include the effect of permeability on the
squeeze lm lubrication of long partial porous journal
bearings with couple stress uids.
Analysis
A schematic diagram of the problem under study is shown
in Figure 1. The journal of radius R approaches the
porous bearing surface at a circumferential section u with
velocity V
u
.
The lm thickness h is a function of u and is given by
h C 2 e cos u; 1
where C is the radial clearance and e is the eccentricity of the
journal centre. The lubricant in the lm region and also in the
porous region is assumed to be a Stokes (1966) couple stress
uid.
Under the usual assumptions of uid lm lubrication
applicable to thin lms (Cameron, 1987), the equation of
motion of an incompressible couple stress uid within the lm
region, when the body forces and body couples are absent, are
given by
p
x
m

2
u
y
2
2h

4
u
y
4
; 2
p
y
0; 3
u
x

v
y
0: 4
The ow of couplestress uid in a porous matrix is
governed by the modied Darcy law, which account for the
polar effects
~ q
2k
m1 2b
7p; 5
where ~ q u; v; and b h=m=k:
The ratio (h/m)
1/2
is of dimensional length and hence
characterizes the chain length of the polymer additives. Hence
the parameter b represents the ratio of the microstructure size
to the pore size. The p is the pressure in the porous region.
Owing to continuity, it satises the Laplace equation

2
p
x
2


2
p
y
2
0: 6
The relevant boundary conditions for the velocity
components are:
(1) at the boundary surface y h :
u 0; 7a

2
u
y
2
0; 7b
v 2V
u
: 7c
(2) at the porous journal surface y 0 :
u 0; 8a

2
u
y
2
0; 8b
v 2v

: 8c
The solution of equation (2) subject to the boundary
conditions (7(a) and 7(b)) and (8(a) and 8(b)) is
ux; y
1
2m
p
x
yy 2 h 2l
2
1 2
cosh2y 2 h=2l
coshh=2l
_ _ _ _
;
9
where l h=m
1=2
is the couple stress parameter.
Integrating equation (6) with respect to y over the porous
layer thickness H
0
and using the boundary conditions of solid
bearing
p
y
0
_ _
at y 2H
0
we obtain,
p
y

y0
2
_
0
2H0

2
p
x
2
_ _
dy: 10
On the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous journal bearings
N.B. Naduvinamani, P.S. Hiremath and Syeda Tasneem Fathima
Industrial Lubrication and Tribology
Volume 57 Number 1 2005 1220
13
Assuming that the porous layer thickness H
0
is very small and
using the pressure continuity condition p p at the
interface y 0 of porous matrix and uid lm, equation (10)
reduces to
p

y0
2H
0

2
p
x
2
: 11
Then, the vertical component of the modied Darcy velocity,
v at the interface y 0 is given by
v

j
y0

kH
0
1 2b

p
x
2
_ _
: 12
Integrating equation (4) across the uid lm and utilizing
boundary conditions (7(c)) and (8(c)) and expressions in (9)
and (12) in the modied Reynolds type equation is obtained
in the form

x
f h; l
12kH
0
1 2b
_ _
p
x
_ _
212mV
u
; 13
where f h; l h
3
2 12l
2
h 24l
3
tanhh=2l and
V
u
2
dh
dt
C
d1
dt
cos u:
Introducing the non-dimensional quantities:
p
pC
2
mR
2
d1=dt
; u
x
R
;

h
h
C
1 21 cos u;

l
l
C
and c
kH
0
C
3
:
Equation (13) takes the form

u
f

h;

l
12c
1 2b
_ _
p
u
_ _
212 cos u 14
where f

h;

l

h
3
2 12

l
2

h 24

l
3
tanh

h=2

l:
As the permeability parameter c !0; equation (14) reduces
to the corresponding solid case studied by Lin (1997a b).
Squeeze lm pressure
For the 1808 partial journal bearing, the boundary conditions
for the uid lm pressure are
p 0 at u ^
p
2
15a
d p
du
0 at u 0: 15b
Integrating equation (14) with respect to u and the use of
boundary conditions (15(a) and (b)) yield the non-
dimensional uid lm pressure as
p 212
_
uu
u2p=2
sin
2
u
f

h;

l
12c
12b
_ _ du: 16
Load carrying capacity
The load carrying capacity of the 1808 porous partial journal
bearing is evaluated by integrating the uid lm pressure eld
acting on the journal:
W
_
up=2
u2p=2
p cos u Rdu; 17
Figure 1 Physical conguration of porous partial journal bearing
On the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous journal bearings
N.B. Naduvinamani, P.S. Hiremath and Syeda Tasneem Fathima
Industrial Lubrication and Tribology
Volume 57 Number 1 2005 1220
14
where W represents the load carrying capacity per unit
length of the porous bearing generated by the squeeze lm
pressure.
The non-dimensional form of equation (17) is

W
WC
2
mR
3
d1=dt
12
_
up=2
u2p=2
sin
2
u
f

h;

l
12c
12b
_ _ du
g1;

l; c: 18
The closed form integration of the integrals appearing in
equations (16) and (18) is not possible and hence they are
obtained numerically.
Time-height relationship
The time taken by the journal centre to move from 1 0 to 1
1
can be obtained from equation (18) as
d1
dt

1
g1;

l; c
; 19
where
t
WC
2
mR
3
t
is the non- dimensional response time.
The rst-order non-linear differential equation (19) is
solved numerically using the fourth-order Runge-Kutta
method (Steven and Reymond, 1998) with the initial
condition
1 0 at t 0: 20
Results and discussion
The effect of permeability on the squeeze lm characteristics
of a long porous journal bearing is observed through the non-
dimensional permeability parameter c and effect of couple
stresses through the non-dimensional couple stress parameter

l: The parameter

l

h=m
_
=C is the ratio of microstructure
size to the radial clearance. Hence

l gives a mechanism of
interaction of uid with the bearing geometry. It is to be noted
that as c !0 the problem reduces to the corresponding solid
case and as

l; b !0 it reduces to the corresponding
Newtonian case.
Squeeze lm pressure
The variation of non-dimensional squeeze lm pressure p as a
function of circumferential co-ordinate u for various values of

l is shown in Figure 2 with the parametric values c 0:01 and

1 0:1:
It is observed that the effect of couple stresses is to increase
the squeeze lm pressure p as compared to the corresponding
Newtonian case. Increase in p is more pronounced for larger
values of

l: The effect of eccentricity ratio parameter 1 on
the variation of p with u is shown in Figure 3 for c 0:01
Figure 2 Non-dimensional lm pressure p as a function of u for different values of l

with c 0.01 and 1 0.1

On the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous journal bearings
N.B. Naduvinamani, P.S. Hiremath and Syeda Tasneem Fathima
Industrial Lubrication and Tribology
Volume 57 Number 1 2005 1220
15
and

l 0:2: It is observed that p increases for increasing
values of 1.
Figure 4 shows the variation of p with u for different
values of the permeability parameter c with 1 0:5 and

l 0:2:
The dotted curve in the gure corresponds to the solid case.
The effect of permeability parameter c is to decrease p as
compared to the corresponding solid case. The variation of
maximum pressure p
max
i:e: p at u 0 with c for
different values of

l is shown in Figure 5 with 1 0:5: It is
observed that p
max
increases as c decreases. This increase in
p
max
is more accentuated for larger values of

l:
Load-carrying capacity
Figure 6 shows the variation of non-dimensional load-
carrying capacity

W as a function of the eccentricity ratio
parameter 1 for the different values of

l:
It is found that

W increases for increasing values of 1. The
increase in

W for couplestress uids as compared to the
corresponding Newtonian case is observed and is more
pronounced for larger values of

l: The variation in

W with

l for
different values of c is shown in Figure 7.
It is observed that

W decreases for increasing values of
c and this decrease in

W is more accentuated for larger values
of

l:
Time-height relationship
The response time of squeeze lm is an important factor in
the design of squeeze lm bearings. This is the time elapsed to
reduce the initial lm thickness to the minimum permissible
squeeze lm height. The variation of the non-dimensional
minimum squeeze lm height

h
0
1 21 with the non-
dimensional response time t for the different values of

l is
shown in Figure 8. It is observed that the bearing with
couplestress uid as lubricant have longer response time as
compared to the Newtonian case.
Figure 9 shows the variation of

h
0
with t for different values
of c with

l 0:2: The response time of the squeeze lm t
decreases for increasing values of c. This is due to the
reduction in

W with increasing c.
Conclusions
The squeeze lm lubrication of long porous partial
journal bearings with couplestress uid is presented on the
basis of Stokes microcontinuum theory for couple stress
uids. As the permeability parameter c !0; the squeeze
lm characteristics presented in this paper agrees with
those of solid case studied by Lin (1997a b). It is found
that the effect of permeability is to reduce the non-
dimensional load-carrying capacity and to decrease the
response time as compared to the corresponding solid
case. However, the effect of couple stresses is to enhance
the load carrying capacity and to lengthen the response
time. Hence, in the design of porous partial journal
bearings, the reduction in the load carrying capacity and the
response time can be compensated by the use of lubricants
with proper microstructures by which the bearing life can
be increased.
Figure 3 Non-dimensional lm pressure p as a function of u for different values of 1 with c 0.01 and l

0.2
On the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous journal bearings
N.B. Naduvinamani, P.S. Hiremath and Syeda Tasneem Fathima
Industrial Lubrication and Tribology
Volume 57 Number 1 2005 1220
16
Figure 4 Non-dimensional lm pressure p as a function of u for different values of c with 1 0.5 and l

0.2
Figure 5 Maximum lm pressure p
max
vs c for different values of l

with 10.5
On the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous journal bearings
N.B. Naduvinamani, P.S. Hiremath and Syeda Tasneem Fathima
Industrial Lubrication and Tribology
Volume 57 Number 1 2005 1220
17
Figure 6 Non-dimensional load-carrying capacity W

vs 1 for different values of l

with c 0.01 and 1 0.1

Figure 7 Non-dimensional load-carrying capacity W

vs l

for different values of c with 1 0.3

On the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous journal bearings
N.B. Naduvinamani, P.S. Hiremath and Syeda Tasneem Fathima
Industrial Lubrication and Tribology
Volume 57 Number 1 2005 1220
18
Figure 8 Non-dimensional minimum lm height h

0
vs t for different values of l

with 10.1 and c 0.01

Figure 9 Non-dimensional minimum lm height vs t for different values of c with l

0.2
On the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous journal bearings
N.B. Naduvinamani, P.S. Hiremath and Syeda Tasneem Fathima
Industrial Lubrication and Tribology
Volume 57 Number 1 2005 1220
19
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On the squeeze lm lubrication of long porous journal bearings
N.B. Naduvinamani, P.S. Hiremath and Syeda Tasneem Fathima
Industrial Lubrication and Tribology
Volume 57 Number 1 2005 1220
20