2013 Volume 58 Issue 2 Pages 102-108
One of the most important but complicated issues for mechanical seals is how to realize two contradictory functions: the sealing and the lubricating performance between the seal surfaces. Various studies have been carried out to solve the problem. However, few fundamental solutions have been presented so far. In our previous report, the surface structure for achieving the low-friction and low-leakage mechanical seals was proposed. In this report, the fundamental characteristics of sealing and lubricating function for the surface structures that we proposed in previous report were investigated by numerical calculations. JAKOBSSON-FLOBERG’s boundary condition was applied in order to consider the mass conservation at the cavitation boundary. Moreover, the effect of cavitation pressure on the sealing and lubricating performance were also investigated. The results indicated that the surface structure could simplify and clarify the surface design procedure for mechanical seals, and could predict and control the leakage rate and the film thickness based on hydrodynamic lubrication theory.
