Application of the ultrasonic oil film thickness measurement system in bearing chambers

The oil film thickness in aero-engine bearing chamber influences the heat transfer capacity of the bearing chamber wall, so measuring oil film thickness accuspeedly is essential to the design and thermal analysis of lubricating oil system. In this paper, software and hardware of an ultrasonic measurement system based on pulse echo technique, which measures the oil film thickness in bearing chamber, are established. The hardware system mainly consists of signal acquisition card, probe, delay block and the corresponding cables. Functions as measurement parameter setup, real-time display of measured waveforms, post-processing and so on are included in the measurement software. Finally, the oil film thickness of the wall is measured with the measurement system developed. Signal quality of the dynamic measurement is analyzed. Comparison and analysis of different oil film thickness under different rotation rates are conducted.