Direct Outer Ring Cooling of a High Speed Jet Engine Mainshaft Ball Bearing: Experimental Investigation Results

Author(s):  
Peter Gloeckner ◽  
Klaus Dullenkopf ◽  
Michael Flouros

Operating conditions in high speed mainshaft ball bearings applied in new aircraft propulsion systems require enhanced bearing designs and materials. Rotational speeds, loads, demands on higher thrust capability, and reliability have increased continuously over the last years. A consequence of these increasing operating conditions are increased bearing temperatures. A state of the art jet engine high speed ball bearing has been modified with an oil channel in the outer diameter of the bearing. This oil channel provides direct cooling of the outer ring. Rig testing under typical flight conditions has been performed to investigate the cooling efficiency of the outer ring oil channel. In this paper the experimental results including bearing temperature distribution, power dissipation, bearing oil pumping and the impact on oil mass and parasitic power loss reduction are presented.

Author(s):  
Peter Gloeckner ◽  
Klaus Dullenkopf ◽  
Michael Flouros

Operating conditions in high speed mainshaft ball bearings applied in new aircraft propulsion systems require enhanced bearing designs and materials. Rotational speeds, loads, demands on higher thrust capability, and reliability have increased continuously over the last years. A consequence of these increasing operating conditions are increased bearing temperatures. A state of the art jet engine high speed ball bearing has been modified with an oil channel in the outer diameter of the bearing. This oil channel provides direct cooling of the outer ring. Rig testing under typical flight conditions has been performed to investigate the cooling efficiency of the outer ring oil channel. In this paper, the experimental results including bearing temperature distribution, power dissipation, and bearing oil pumping and the impact on oil mass and parasitic power loss reduction are presented.


Author(s):  
Sidharath Sharma ◽  
Jorge García-Tíscar ◽  
John M. Allport ◽  
Martyn L. Jupp ◽  
Ambrose K. Nickson

Ported shroud casing treatment is widely used to delay the onset of surge and thereby enhancing the aerodynamic stability of a centrifugal compressor by recirculating the low momentum fluid in the blade passage. Performance losses associated with the use of recirculation casing treatment are well established in the literature and this is an area of active research. The other, less researched aspect of the casing treatment is its impact on the acoustics of the compressor. This work investigates the impact of ported shroud casing treatment on the acoustic characteristics of the compressor. The flow in two compressor configurations viz. with and without casing treatment operating at the design operating conditions of an iso-speed line are numerically modelled and validated with experimental data from gas stand measurements. The pressure fluctuations calculated as the flow solution are used to compute the spectral signatures at multiple locations to investigate the acoustic phenomenon associated with each configuration. Propagation of the frequency content through the ducts has been estimated with the aid of method of characteristics to enhance the content coming from the compressor. Expected tonal aerodynamic noise sources such as monopole (buzz-saw tones) and dipole (Blade Pass Frequency) are clearly identified in the acoustic spectra of the two configurations. The comparison of two configurations shows higher overall levels and tonal content in the case of a compressor with ported shroud operating at design conditions due to the presence of ‘mid-tones’.


Author(s):  
Jee Loong Hee ◽  
Kathy Simmons ◽  
David Hann ◽  
Michael Walsh

Abstract Surface waves are observed in many situations including natural and engineering applications. Experiments conducted at the Gas Turbine and Transmissions Research Centre (G2TRC) used high speed imaging to observe multiscale wave structures close to an aeroengine ball bearing in a test rig. The dynamic behavior and scale of the waves indicate that these are shear-driven although highly influenced by gravity at low shaft speed. To understand the interactions between gas and liquid phases including momentum and mass transfers, characterization of the observed waves and ligaments was undertaken. Waves were studied at surfaces close to the ball bearing and ligaments were assessed near the cage. Characterization was in terms of frequency and wavelength as functions of speed, flow-rate, bearing axial load and gravity. The assessments confirmed the existence of gravity-capillary waves and capillary waves. Gravity-capillary waves were measured to have a longer mean wavelength on the co-current side of the bearing (gravity and shear acting together) compared to the counter-current side (gravity and shear opposing). Using a published definition of critical wavelength (λcrit), measured wavelengths at 3,000 rpm were 2.56λcrit on the co-current side compared to 1.86λcrit at the countercurrent location. As shaft speed increases, wavelength reduces with transition to capillary waves occurring at around 0.83λcrit. At shaft speeds beyond 5000 rpm, capillary waves were fully visible and the wavelength was obtained as 0.435λcrit. Flow-rate and load did not significantly influence wavelength. Wave frequency was found to be proportional to shaft speed. The gravity-capillary waves had frequencies within the range 13–25 Hz while capillary waves exhibited a frequency well beyond 100 Hz. The frequencies are highly fluctuating with no effect of load and flow rate observed. Ligaments were characterized using Weber number and Stability number. The number of ligaments increased with shaft speed. A correlation for ligament number based on operating conditions is proposed.


2020 ◽  
Vol 72 (7) ◽  
pp. 845-850
Author(s):  
Yue Liu

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to clarify the relationship between fatigue life and kinematics of angular contact ball bearing. It proposes a new modeling method of spin to roll ratio based on raceway friction, which is more accurate than the traditional raceway control theory. Design/methodology/approach The uniform model of spin to roll ratio based on raceway friction in a wide speed range is proposed using quasi-statics method, which considers centrifugal force, gyroscopic moment, friction force of raceway and other influencing factors. The accuracy is considerably improved compared with the static model without increasing too much computation. Findings A uniform model for spin to roll ratio of angular contact ball bearing based on raceway friction is established, and quite different relationships between fatigue life and speed under two operating conditions are found. Research limitations/implications The conclusion of this paper is based on the bearing basic fatigue life calculation theory provided by ISO/TS 16281; however, the accuracy of theory needs to be further verified. Practical implications This paper provides guidance for applying angular contact ball bearing, especially at a high speed. Originality/value This paper reveals the changing trend of fatigue life of angular contact ball bearing with the speed under different loads. Peer review The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/ILT-01-2020-0030


Author(s):  
Zhan Yi ◽  
Naoki Oya ◽  
Koji Enoki ◽  
Tomio Okawa ◽  
Shuji Ohno ◽  
...  

A liquid jet is of considerable importance in many industrial fields including jet cleaning, jet engine and combustion. As an important example, the Monju nuclear power plant in Japan experienced a sodium leak in 1995. This led to a fire accident because the sodium reacted with oxygen in the air. To predict the significance of the fire accident, accurate evaluation of the amount of splashed droplets caused by the sodium jet impingement is of great importance. In this work, the relationship between the condition of a liquid jet and the amount of splashed droplets is explored experimentally. In the experiments, a liquid jet was emanated vertically downward from a circular nozzle onto a liquid film formed on a horizontal plate. Visualization using a high speed camera was performed to observe the condition of the liquid jet. From the nozzle, the mode of the liquid jet changed jet, lump and drop. Here, the jet mode means the continuous jet with smooth surface, the lump mode the continuous jet with disturbed surface and the drop mode the broken jet. Dependences of the transition length to each mode on the important parameters such as the jet velocity and the nozzle diameter were investigated. Measurement was also conducted for the splash ratio that is defined as the ratio of the amount of splashed droplets to the jet flow rate. It was found that the splash ratio is high when the liquid jet is in the drop mode at the impact point. It was shown that the splash ratio can be correlated well as a function of the impact Weber number and the Strouhal number of the droplets impinging the liquid film.


Author(s):  
Veronica Ferrara ◽  
Lars E. Bakken

The new wet gas compression technology provides a big potential for improved recovery from new and depleting gas/condensate fields. The current technology is based on centrifugal and axial compressor principles, which offers both the benefits of well-known concept design and the drawbacks of erosion, fouling, surge and instabilities. These concepts are based mainly on the design of a traditional compressor. This partly reflects performance requirements for handling pure gas and partly the lack of a fundamental understanding of wet gas behaviour through an impeller stage. Process and operating conditions may vary considerably during start-up at gas only or completely filled with addition of liquid with an inlet and/or discharge transient flow regime. An advanced wet gas test rig has been designed to identify the fundamental mechanisms related to wet gas compressor surge and instability behaviour. The open-loop wet gas rig includes a single overhung impeller, sections of visualisation for the wet gas impeller inlet, discharge and diffuser. The paper reviews and exposes the instabilities and surge flow behaviour at the impeller eye. Main focuses are the shift in inlet flow regime, the impact on overall compressor stage performance and the ability to handle wet transient inlet conditions. Any flow separation and/or slip across the inlet and impeller eye section will alter the established dry gas design guide lines for compressors. Visualisation of the impeller inlet during surge progression is the focal point of the present study. The investigation is supplemented by fast Fourier transform (FFT) analyses and high-speed measurements.


Author(s):  
Wenwu Wu ◽  
Jun Hong ◽  
Xiaohu Li ◽  
Yang Li ◽  
Baotong Li

With the increasing demand of higher operating speed for bearing system, more challenges have been exposed on the maintaining of the bearing performance. Preloading is an effective method to handle these challenges. Traditionally, the preloading of bearing system has been applied by uniform approaches such as rigid preload and constant preload. However, this treatment may hardly deal with the optimization of preloading problem due to the non-uniformity of the bearing stiffness becomes more apparent under high-speed operating conditions. A novel and practical approach is therefore presented in this paper to incorporate the non-uniformity effect to improve the structural performance of bearing under actual operating conditions. Firstly, the critical relationship between the stiffness behaviour and the non-uniform preload is evaluated for bearing system. The stiffness problem of angular contact ball bearing system is then formulated analytically by Jones’ model. With this approach, boundary conditions are achieved to solve the local contact deformation and predict the bearing life under non-uniform preload. Finally, both the uniform preload and the non-uniform preload cases for bearing system are simulated under various operating conditions. Comparing with traditional methods, the proposed method can provide a better solution in both stiffness and life that will enable a designer to obtain a deep insight on the optimization of bearing system.


2005 ◽  
Vol 128 (1) ◽  
pp. 178-182 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Flouros

Trends in aircraft engine design have caused an increase in mechanical stress requirements for rolling bearings. Consequently, a high amount of heat is rejected, which results in high oil scavenge temperatures. An RB199 turbofan bearing and its associated chamber were modified to carry out a survey aiming to reduce power losses in bearing chambers. The test bearing was a 124 mm PCD ball bearing with a split inner ring employing under-race lubrication by two individual jets. The survey was carried out in two parts. In the first part, the investigations were focused on the impact on the power losses in the bearing chamber of the operating parameters, such as oil flow, oil temperature, sealing air flow, bearing chamber pressure, and shaft speed. In the second part, the investigations focused on the reduction of the dwell time of the air and oil mixture in the bearing compartment and its impact on the power losses. In this part, porous screens were introduced around the bearing. These screens would aid the oil to flow out of the compartment and reduce droplet-droplet interactions as well as droplet-bearing chamber wall interactions. The performance of the screens was evaluated by torque measurements. A high-speed camera was used to visualize the flow in the chamber. Considerable reduction in power loss was achieved. This work is part of the European Research programme GROWTH ATOS (Advanced Transmission and Oil Systems).


2017 ◽  
Vol 140 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Wang Yunlong ◽  
Wang Wenzhong ◽  
Li Yulong ◽  
Zhao Ziqiang

Lubrication analysis of rolling bearing is often conducted with assumed operating conditions, which does not consider the effect of internal dynamics of rolling bearing. In this paper, the effects of the applied load and bearing rotational speed on the lubrication performance in an angular contact ball bearing are conducted, which combines the bearing dynamic analysis and thermo-elastohydrodynamic lubrication (TEHL) analysis. First, the internal motions and contact forces are obtained from the developed bearing dynamic model, and then were integrated into the TEHL model to investigate the lubrication performance of the bearing. The results show that the rotational speed and external load has significant effects on film thickness, temperature, and power loss; if the improper axial load is applied for certain bearing speed, the lubrication performance will deteriorate and thermal failure may occur; there exists critical load or speed to keep good lubrication performance and avoid thermal failure; the skidding contributes to the thermal failure and bad lubrication performance.


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