Empirical prediction of the shear layer thickness in lubricating films

A computational procedure has been presented by Wang and Seireg (1993) for the thermohydrodynamic analysis of fluid film bearings with the assumption of a central heat generation (shear) zone and the consideration of the thermal expansion across the film. This paper presents a dimensionless relationship for predicting the thickness of the shear layer in lubricating films, which is developed based on the extensive experimental data for the journal bearing reported by Ezzat (1971) and Seireg and Ezzat (1973). The relationship which was found to be a function of Sommerfeld and Peclet numbers is then applied to evaluate the pressure distribution for other cases of journal and slider bearings. The results show excellent correlation with the experimental results in all the investigated conditions.