Analysis of the nonlinear dynamic response of a rotor supported on ball bearings with floating-ring squeeze film dampers

A dynamic model of a rotor supported on ball bearings with floating-ring squeeze film dampers (FSFD) is established. In the model, the coupling effect between rotor, ball bearing and FSFD is considered. An efficient numerical integration approach has been employed to conduct the investigation into the rotor system. The results show that FSFD can effectively prevent bistable response, and the performance has also been demonstrated by experiments. Furthermore, the numerical results show that the speed range of non-synchronous motion response of rotor system increases as supporting stiffness increases. When floating-ring mass is less than the lumped mass at the journal position, the speed range of non-synchronous motion decreases as floating-ring mass increases. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.