• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.240-248
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• 2011

Mechanical face seal installed in primary heat transport pump used for heavy water reactor prevents leakage of working fluid using thin working fluid film between primary seal ring and mating ring. If the leakage of working fluid exceeds the allowable volume, serious accident can be happened by the trouble of primary heat transport pump. The thinner fluid film exists between primary seal ring and mating ring, the less working fluid leaks out. On the other hand, if the thickness of fluid film is not enough, the life of mechanical face seal will be reduced by friction and wear. Therefore appropriate design is necessary to maximize the performance and life of mechanical face seal. In this study, numerical analysis using finite volume method was conducted to investigate the performance of mechanical face seals which have same deep straight groove and 11 different net coning values. As results, equilibrium clearance between primary seal ring and mating ring, leakage volume of working fluid, friction torque on sealing surface and stiffness of working fluid film were obtained. With increasing net coning value, equilibrium clearance and leakage volume increase, and friction torque and stiffness of fluid film decrease.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers
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• v.18 no.12
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• pp.3404-3412
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• 1994

The present study was undertaken to investigate the dry wear process and wear mechanism of the alumina ceramics in the purity variation which are used for the mechanical seal, roll, liner and dies. The wear test was carried out under different experimental condition using the wear testing device and in which the annular surface rubbed on dry sliding condition various sliding speed, contact pressure and sliding distance. In case of alumina purity 95%, there was speed range which wear loss increased rapidly owing to enlargement of heat impact force and temperature rise of wear surface. According as the alumina purity increased, wear loss decreased but alumina purity 85% with much void and defect had the most wear loss than any other alumina purity. The friction coefficient of sliding initial stage of wear curves has a large value but according to increase of sliding distance, it decreased owing to drop of the shear strength of wear surfaces.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.230-239
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• 2010

Mechanical face seal installed in boiler feedwater pump prevents leakage of working fluid using thin fluid film between stator and rotor. If the leakage of working fluid exceeds the allowable volume, serious malfunction of boiler feedwater pump will be happen. The thinner fluid film exists between stator and rotor, the less working fluid leaks out. However, if the thickness of fluid film is not enough, the wear of seal face will be increased. And it causes the decrease in life of mechanical face seal. Therefore appropriate design is necessary to maximize the performance and life of mechanical face seal. In this study, numerical analysis using finite volume method was conducted to investigate the static characteristics of wavy mechanical face seals which have 4 different wavy surface profiles on rotor. As a result, opening force, leakage volume of working fluid and friction torque were obtained. For the same minimum film thickness, the static characteristics of mechanical face seal were affected by the wavy surface profile which can change the thickness of working fluid film and pressure distribution.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.24 no.12
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• pp.2989-2994
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• 2000

A mechanical face seal is a tribo-element intended to control leakage of working fluid at the interface of a rotating shaft and its housing. Leakage of working fluid decreases drastically as the clearance between mating seal faces gets smaller. But the very small clearance may result in an increased reduction of seal life because of high wear and heat generation. Therefore, in the design of mechanical face seals a compromise between low leakage and acceptable seal life is important, ant it present a difficult and practical design problem. A fluid film or sealing dam geometry of the seal clearance affects seal lubrication performance very much, and thereby is optimization is one of the main design consideration. in this study the Reynolds equation for the sealing dam of mechanical face seals is numerically analyzed, using the Galerkin finite element method, which is readily applied to various seal geometries, to give lubrication performances, such as opening force, restoring moment, leakage, and axial and angular stiffness coefficients. Then, to improve the seal performance an optimization is performed, considering various design variables simultaneously. For the tested case the optimization ha successfully resulted in the optimal design values of outer and inner seal radii, coning, seal clearance, and balance radius while satisfying all the operation subjected constraints and design variable side-constraints, and improvements of axial and angular stiffness coefficients by 16.8% and 2.4% respectively and reduction of leakage by 38.4% have been achieved.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.23 no.1 s.178
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• pp.145-151
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• 2006

Wheel bearing unit has been exclusively applied to car wheel supporting device. The seal for wheel bearing is required to have both high sealing effects and low reaction forces because wheel bearing are operated on adverse environmental conditions such as mud and splash water. High sealing effects are for the protection of bearing ball wear from dust influx. In order to ensure high sealing effects, it is a easiest way to increase contact force which are affected by geometric characteristics, material properties and interferences between seal and inner bearing but induces higher wear phenomena. Interferences in all variables are most important factor to determine the performance of wheel bearing. In this study, optimization of interference amount was performed with finite element analysis with commercial code ABAQUS. For the sake of finite element analysis, tensile tests of rubber material were conducted and governing equation of nonlinear behavior was achieved. Hock-up bearing was manufactured with optimized interference amount. Results of torque and mud spray tests using this bearing unit are performed. Less torque and moisture influx of bearing with optimized interference amount is evidence to validity of this study.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.102-108
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• 2015

In this research, we experimentally investigated the sealing performance of elastomeric rotary lip seals for washing machines. In general, NBR is used as a material for elastomeric rotary lip seals in washing machines, but the mixing formula of the rubber material can affect the sealing performance. In this study, we manufactured rotary lip seals using three kinds of NBRs with a different mixing formula, and examined the sealing performance using an acceleration test mode. The results of an SEM investigation into the surfaces of three kinds of specimens showed a much smaller wear volume and better sealing performance for the specimens with smaller particle sizes of mixing composition than for the specimen with the larger. Repeated deformation and recovery by the shaft-to-seal eccentricity on rotation were shown to cause a phase difference in the rubber material, and we measured the recovery ratio to find the influence of this phase difference on the sealing performance. As another method for checking the phase difference, we also measured tan ä, and a lower tan ä was revealed as the recovery ratio increased for each specimen. Specimens with a higher recovery ratio (lower tan ä) were shown to have a better sealing performance. Consequently, specimens with a smaller particle size in the mixing composition had a better sealing performance because they show a higher recovery ratio.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 1992.10a
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• pp.166-171
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• 1992

Mechanical seals are generally used in the fields of industries as sealing devices. The failure of mechanical seals like crack, leakage, breakage fast and severe wear, excessive torque, and squeaking result in big problems. For the development of monitoring system, this study was carried out to identify abnormal phenomina on alumina(AI $\_$2/ O /sub3/) seal ring and resin bonded carbon ring, and to propose the proper parameter for monitoring failure on mechanical seals. Sliding were tests are conducted at 12 experimental conditions that contains 3 different contact pressure and 4 surface conditions. Torque, temperature, and acoustic emission are measured. Optical microstructure and scanning electron microscopy are observed for the wear processing every 10 minute sliding at rotation speed of 1750 RPM.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.47-53
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• 2007

A bearing is one of core parts in automobile. Rubber seal of the bearing is important to improve performance of bearing, formed by hot-press die of rubber seal for the intricate shape. In this study, formed tools are used to machine die of bearing rubber seal and the machining operation is classified into the several process of high precision. Design of experiments is used to optimize selection of the formed tools for the efficient machining of the hot-press die. The cutting force, tool wear and tool life are determined to characteristics. And, the clearance angle, the rake angle and the length cutting edge are considered as the major factors. Experiments are repeated to use one-way factorial design, and tool life is predicted by regression model.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Machine Tool Engineers
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.91-96
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• 2006

The friction and wear properties of ceramics are very important in the applications to engineering ceramic parts such as seal rings, pump parts, automobile meter parts, and so on. In this study, the effects of each other purity on the mechanical and tribological properties of purity zirconia ceramics were investigated. Also in order to determine the effects of sliding distance, sliding speed, contact load, friction coefficient, the amount of worn out material at a certain time, and the prepared composites were measured. Crystalline phases and microstructure were examined with XRD and SEM. The results show that we obtained the good properties of friction coefficient and wear resistance at the purity 99.5% of zirconia. than this of the purity 95% were great at the wear amount of worn out material.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.161-166
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• 2010

Elastomeric seals are widely used in dynamic seal applications, and it is well known that the sealing surfaces can be gradually worn out. Abrasive wear is known to be the most dominant factor; however, little research has been carried out on this problem until now. In this study, a new contact problem related to elastomeric seals-a small spherical particle and steel surface-was modeled and analyzed using MARC. Variations of von-Mises and residual stress distributions as well as deformed seal and steel surface shapes with seal materials and interferences are presented. The stress distribution and surface deformation are highly affected by the elastic properties of seal. For PTFE, the maximum von-Mises stress exceeds the yield strength, and plastic deformation occurs on the steel surface. Therefore, the sealing surface can also be worn down by sub-surface fatigue due to intervening hard particles in the sealing surfaces together with the well-known abrasion.