Abstract
In a companion paper, part 1, a computer-aided design method for pocket elliptical bearings has been developed. Its application is discussed in the current paper, which mutually related goals are: to understand how bearing design and particularly pocket geometry affect the bearing performance, to determine optimal values of the driving variables that control bearing profile and pocket width, to choose a suitable supply groove layout.
As explained in part 1, the developed method does not include an automatic optimization tool. Therefore, in order to reduce the number of the variables that control the bearing geometry involved in the optimization task, the clearance of the assembled bearing (pocket clearance) is kept constant. Hence, the optimization of the bearing shape is performed by changing pocket opening, pad eccentricities, pocket width, lubricant supply mode.
