Abstract: Nanoparticles of 30 nm in diameter are added into a gas thrust bearing, in which the film thickness is 45 μm. Then, a nanoparticles-laden gas film with different nanoparticles volume fraction is formed. The enhancement effect of nanoparticles on gas film load capacity is studied with a self-developed experimental apparatus and the mechanism of this phenomenon is discussed. The load capacity and film pressure before and after adding nanoparticles, which varies with the film thickness, are measured. The variation tendency of load capacity with nanoparticles volume fraction is derived. It is found that the load capacity increases with the increase of nanoparticles volume fraction. When the nanoparticles volume fraction is about 0.04%, the increment of load capacity reaches about 20%. Then, the increment of load capacity decreases gradually. For understanding the variation and the mechanism of load capacity enhancement effects by nanoparticles, fluid mechanics equations that considered gas and nanoparticles interaction are employed to calculate the film pressure distributions. By comparing the numerical and the experimental results, the variations of load capacity with nanoparticles volume fraction are verified. The study proves that nanoparticles has an enhancement effect on gas film load capacity for the first time. Besides, the finding provides an engineering guidance for the design of novel nanoparticles-laden gas film rotor-bearing system.

Key words: Load capacity, Nanoparticles, Nanoparticles-laden gas film, Pressure, Volume fraction, balanced gear shaving, concave-error, Negative modified shaving, non-equilateral profile shaving cutter, transmission error, gear shaving