Static and dynamic characteristics of a downsized aerostatic circular thrust bearing with a single feed hole

Abstract

Aerostatic bearings have been successfully applied to various precision machines because of their advantages, such as high accuracy of motion and low friction. Recently, the application of aerostatic bearings to very small devices has attracted considerable attention. In downsizing aerostatic bearings, the speed of the airflow becomes very high and can easily become supersonic. Accordingly, it is expected that the inertia forces of the airflow will largely affect the bearing characteristics. In this study, the Navier–Stokes equations were solved using a commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software, taking into account the inertia forces of the airflow, and the numerical results obtained using the CFD software and the conventional Reynolds equation were compared with experimental results.