The University of New Mexico

Lionel A Young

Alan Otto Lebeck

A unique wavy-tilt-dam shaped mechanical face seal ring, a mechanical face seal which incorporates the wavy-tilt-dam shaped ring, and an apparatus for shaping seal rings. The face shape of the ring is contoured to include a number of waves, tilts and a dam, for the purposes of promoting hydrostatic and hydrodynamic lift, and minimizing leakage in the seal. The apparatus includes a grinding wheel, a drive motor, a spindle, a cam, a cam follower, and flexure mounts to allow slight rotations of the grinding wheel or the face seal ring being ground, and thereby the apparatus machines contours onto the face of the ring.

Wavy-tilt-dam seal ring and apparatus for shaping seal rings

Wavy-tilt-dam seal ring

A radially compliant and zero net thermal radial taper mechanical face seal. The seal includes a primary seal ring which is radially compliant to the opposing ring due to its narrow ring length, and an opposing ring which has a geometry and physical characteristics such that the thermal rotation caused by itself and the primary ring is zero. The seal includes further design features for enhancing the radial compliance and the zero net thermal rotation characteristics.

Growing community of inventors

Edgewood, NM, United States of America

Lionel A Young