The test rig and investigation of the high-speed rotor supported by foil bearings at increased temperature

This article presents the test plan and the design-build process to build the test rig for high-speed foil bearings whose main aim is to detect the thermal instability in FB. The authors present numerical analysis of the dynamic properties of rotors supported by air foil bearings. The calculations were performed on two versions of the rotor and two values of the clamping force concerning pressing the top foil onto the shaft. In addition, the article discusses the method for selecting the maximum dynamic load that can be safely applied for the rotors. For the calculation and presentation of the results the MESWIR and the GRAF-MESWIR software were used.