An Experimental Research on the Vibration of Surface-Textured Journal Bearings

Growing attention has been paid to surface texture owing to its significance in bearing lubrication, load capacity, and wear resistance. In this paper, research emphasis is placed on the influence of texture distributions on bearing vibration and rotor stability. With microfabrication techniques, three kinds of textures configurations (0-90° partial distribution, 0-160° partial distribution, and 0-160° full distribution) are designed and applied on the lower pad surface. The experiment of journal bearings is carried out. The experiment results show that there is a significant decrease in acceleration amplitude of the textured bearings compared to nontextured bearings. Furthermore, the 0-160° partially distributed journal bearings have better vibration damping effect than another two kinds of textures, which can be verified by the shaft center orbits, Fourier spectrums, and waterfall plots.