Some Aspects of Determining the Flow Factors

Abstract

The uncertainty in calculated results of the flow factors greatly limits the application of the average flow model [1] which otherwise is an approach with broad prospects for studying the lubrication behavior of rough surfaces. The effects of boundary conditions, grid systems, and surface statistics on the flow factors are discussed in the paper, and the reason why the calculated results for the flow factors obtained by different researchers widely differ from each other is revealed. The research shows that ∂p /∂y over the micro-bearing has an effect on the calculated value of flow factors; the influence of the sideflow arises from the simulation approach itself, in which a micro-bearing is used for determining flow factors; the grid systems and the procedure to generate random surfaces may change the statistics of the surfaces used in calculation and affect the results thereby.