Honeywell International Inc.

Alliedsignal Inc.

William Lee Giesler

Kellan P Geck

Todd Langston

Robbie Joseph Adams

James Vincent Guiheen

Jimmy Wiggins

Dean Robert Anderson

Charles J Gasdaska

Steven E Sund

Brad King

Brent Bristol

David M Mathis

Robert H Feest

Jonathan S Hager

Eric Passman

Louie Timothy Gaines

Gary A Farnsworth

Todd A Kincheloe

Todd C Garrod

David B Tornquist

Tina Hynes

Ronald A Peck

Charles J Alten

Don Takeuchi

Michael J Burns

Marvin K Collins

Cynthia S Byers

Jack Moy

Jeff C Philips

M Rifat Ullah

Lennox Bruce

Jeffrey D Grout

A foil bearing assembly for supporting a rotating member that rotates about an axis including a stationary mount member spaced from the rotating member so that a gap is defined between the stationary mount member and the rotating member. A foil member is disposed in the gap between the rotating member and the stationary mount member. At least one of the rotating member, the stationary mount member or the foil member includes a wear resistant coating layer.

Wear resistant foil bearing assembly

A bearing assembly comprises an inner ring and an outer ring assembly having an upstream face and a downstream face. The outer ring assembly comprises an outer ring rotatably coupled to the inner ring, and a plurality of rolling elements that resides between the inner ring and the outer ring. At least one flow bypass channel extends through the outer ring assembly.

Bearing with fluid flow bypass

An output shaft air/oil separator system comprises an outer housing, an oil passage, a spline shaft having a cavity formed therein that communicates with the oil passage, an output shaft disposed at least partially within the spline shaft cavity that has a first section spaced apart from an inner surface of the spline shaft to form a gap therebetween in communication with the spline shaft cavity and a second section contacting at least a portion of the spline shaft inner surface, a housing cavity defined by at least a portion of an outer surface of the spline shaft and the outer housing, an annular groove formed in the spline shaft communicating with the spline shaft cavity, and at least one port extending between the spline shaft inner and outer surfaces in communication with the annular groove and the housing cavity.

Output shaft air/oil separator to redundantly protect against output shaft o-ring leakage

A low leakage seal for separating two environments and contacting a component surface is provided. The seal includes a base and an annular rib. The annular rib is coupled to and extends from the base. The annular rib includes at least one contact surface configured to contact the component surface having a plurality of angularly cut radial grooves formed therein. The annular rib flexes and pressure energizes in the presence of a pressure differential between the two environments.

Over center high deflection pressure energizing low leakage seal

An actuator that at least inhibits the deleterious effects of corrosive fluids, such as seawater, does not rely on relatively expensive materials, and is capable of operation and relatively high pressures includes two sealed buffer chambers. One buffer chamber is supplied with a buffer fluid, and the other buffer chamber is maintained at a vacuum pressure. The buffer fluid in the first buffer chamber helps remove any residual corrosive fluid that may remain on the actuator translation member as it moves into the actuator housing, and any fluid that leaks into the second chamber will boil as a result of the vacuum pressure therein.

Self-contained sea water linear actuator

A method for making aerospace face seal rotors reinforced by rhenium metal, alloy, or composite in combination with silicon carbide or other ceramic. The resulting rotor also is disclosed. Ceramic grains, preferably silicon carbide (SiC), are mixed with powdered metallic (PM) binder that may be based on a refractory metal, preferably rhenium. The mixture is applied to a rotor substrate. The combined ceramic-metal powder mixture is heated to sintering temperature under pressure to enable fusion of the ceramic in the resulting metal-based substrate. A load may then be applied under an elevated temperature. The resulting coated rotor can exhibit high hot hardness, increased durability and/or high hot wear resistance, as well as high thermal conductivity.

Use of powder metal sintering/diffusion bonding to enable applying silicon carbide or rhenium alloys to face seal rotors

An air turbine starter (ATS) configured to couple to a gearbox, the ATS including an output shaft having an outer peripheral surface, a gearbox section, and an ATS section, the gearbox section configured to be disposed within, and coupled to, the gearbox and the ATS section configured to be disposed within the ATS, and a shield plate extending radially from the outer peripheral surface and coupled to the ATS section of the output shaft.

Air turbine starter enhancement for clearance seal utilization

An improved oil seal is provided for sealing passage of a rotatable shaft through an end wall of a bearing housing in a turbomachine or the like, wherein the shaft is rotatably supported within the bearing housing by oil-lubricated bearings. The improved oil seal comprises a dynamic oil-air separator and a slinger rotor mounted on the shaft for rotation therewith, the slinger rotor having an outwardly extending slinger ring with an outboard seal face with radially oriented slots and a circumferential groove or grooves.

Non-contacting clearance seal for high misalignment applications

A fluid-cooled seal rotor is described for a seal assembly that includes a seal case, a seal stator, and wherein the rotor has a sealing face on a first side and a heat-transfer structure on a second side. The heat-transfer structure may be a roughened surface. The heat-transfer structure may have protrusions which may be fins, including fins with roughened surfaces. The heat-transfer structure may have additional heat-transfer structures thereon to create complex, including fractal, structures. The fins may be shaped as impellers to move oil over the heat-transfer structure. Channels between fins may have a width greater than twice the boundary layer thickness for the fluid engaged by the fins. The fluid-cooled rotor, the seal assembly having the fluid-cooled rotor, an air turbine starter having the seal assembly, air turbine starters and other machines with rotating shafts using the seal are within the scope of the invention.

Fluid-cooled mechanical face seal rotor

A ceramic ball bearing assembly has raceway components generally held in residual compression by accompanying metal attachments. In a ceramic ball bearing assembly, an outer raceway is formed that is held in compression by a circumscribing steel ring. The components may be fitted together with the ceramic raceway subject to thermal contraction while the steel ring is subject to thermal expansion. Upon mating, the ceramic raceway slightly expands while the steel ring slightly contracts to impose residual compression upon the ceramic raceway. The residual compression preserves the ceramic raceway despite thermal or other stresses of operating environment. An inner ceramic raceway is constructed by employing one of several of the herein described methods, and the ceramic ball bearing assembly of the present invention may use balls, needles, cylinders, or other rolling elements in order to achieve smooth angular translation between the inner and outer ceramic raceways.

Ceramic ball bearings and assembly

One or more stator seal assemblies are mounted in the housing of a rotating machine such as, for example, an air turbine starter for a gas turbine engine, and surround a rotating shaft. The seal assemblies each include a seal case and a seal. The seal has a face that engages an axial face of a face seal rotor to form a seal. One or more anti-rotation tabs in the seal case engage anti-rotation notches formed in the peripheral surface of the seal. The anti-rotation notches each include substantially arcuate sections formed in notch end surfaces. The arcuate sections increase the amount of wear in the notches that can be tolerated before a potential seal lock-up, thus increasing seal assembly lifetime.

Increased wear-life mechanical face seal anti-rotation system

A composite face seal having an annular seal rotor with a metal base portion and a radially extending flange. The flange having first and second axially facing surfaces. A first ceramic ring is mounted to the first surface of the flange by a first braze joint and a second ceramic ring is mounted to the second surface of the flange by a second braze joint. The composite face seal assembly further includes an annular stator having an axially facing surface that sealingly engages an axially facing surface of one of the ceramic rings. Each of the braze joints may comprise a molybdenum ring disposed between two braze rings or, for thicker seal assemblies, molybdenum and nickel rings disposed between braze rings.

Growing community of inventors

Phoenix, AZ, United States of America

William Lee Giesler