Influence of Grooves of Compound-Structured Submerged Bearings for Vertical Pumps.

For the use of submerged bearings in vertical pumps, a considerable quantity of dry-start bearings come to be used, adapting polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) or ceramics (SiC) as the sliding component and synthetic rubber (NBR) as the cushion. However, pumps equipped with these bearings sometimes give rise to problems related to wear of bearings or vibration of pumps chiefly from the lack of data on these new bearings. Therefore focusing on the grooves on the sliding surface of the bearings, a fundamental test was performed using the test pieces, and it was clarified that the grooves decrease the apparent elasticity and the stress of the sliding surface of the bearings.