An oil transfer unit has a rotating part extending along an axis, a stationary part provided with an oil mouth, and a floating part coupled to the stationary part; the floating part is provided with a cylindrical surface fitted onto an outer cylindrical surface of the rotating part in a non-contact configuration, with an annular groove therebetween to put the oil mouth into communication with an inner chamber of the rotating part; both sides of the groove are sealed by oil films at a radial gap between the cylindrical surfaces of the floating and rotating parts; the unit has a plurality of recesses, which are delimited outwardly by the floating part and inwardly by the rotating part, are arranged on the opposite axial sides of the groove so as to locally enlarge the radial distance with respect to the radial gap and are inwardly closed by the rotating part.

Turbochargers typically have separate hydrodynamic journal and thrust bearings. A turbocharger thrust bearing for a turbocharger is provided that merges the function of a journal bearing into a thrust bearing while maintaining the thrust bearing function to produce a turbocharger with a reduced axial space envelope. Such a thrust bearing includes a bore contoured to have a plurality of taper-land pairs distributed circumferentially about the bore. As a result, the axial length of the turbocharger bearing housing and shaft can be reduced.

A bearing includes a bearing pad for supporting a rotary component and a housing attached to or formed integrally with the bearing pad. The housing includes a flexible column extending towards the bearing pad for providing the bearing pad with an airflow. The column supports the bearing pad from a location inward of an outer periphery of the bearing pad along an axial direction of the bearing. With such a configuration, a resistance of the bearing pad along a radial direction of the bearing is less at the outer periphery than a resistance of the bearing pad along the radial direction proximate the column.

A turbocharger includes: a bearing provided in a turbocharger body, and configured to rotatably support a turbine shaft in an insertion hole formed in the bearing; and an opposing portion which faces an end surface of the bearing in an axial direction of the turbine shaft. An end-surface guide portion is provided to any one of an opposing surface of the bearing which faces the opposing portion, and an opposing surface of the opposing portion which faces the bearing. The end-surface guide portion configured to make the insertion hole and an outer peripheral edge of the end surface of the bearing in radial directions of the turbine shaft communicate with each other extends forward in a rotational direction of the turbine shaft from a part of the end surface of the bearing which communicates with the insertion hole.

A turbocharger is provided with an improved bearing which is formed as a floating ring bearing or a semi-floating ring bearing having a conical or hemispherical shape which supports both journal and thrust loads. The floating ring bearing may have conical floating ring bearings (70), (100), (180) that define inner and outer conical bearing surfaces (71), (108), (185) and (72), (109), (186) which cooperate on the inside with corresponding conical journals (75/76), (111/112), (187/188) that rotate with the shaft (53), and cooperate on the outside with a stationary bearing housing (52) to form inner and outer fluid films. Alternatively, the floating ring bearing may have a pair of hemispherical floating ring bearings (85), (140), (210) that have hemispherical inner and outer bearing surfaces (86), (144), (211) and (87), (145), (212) which form inner and outer fluid films. A semi-floating ring bearing may also be provided with these structures.

A steam valve includes a valve body having a valve seat in a steam channel, a valve stem configured to close the steam channel by coming in contact with the valve seat and to open the steam channel by moving from the valve seat and a guide portion configured to slidably guide the valve stem in a moving direction thereof. The guide portion has a guide body that encloses the valve stem from a radial outer side of the valve stem and a guide bush that is detachably fixed inside the guide body, has an inner surface which abuts and slides on an outer circumferential surface of the valve stem, and is formed of a material having corrosion resistance.

There is provided a turbocharger which can reduce whirl vibration. The turbocharger includes a shaft connecting a turbine and a compressor, a bearing housing having a bearing portion turnably supporting the shaft, and a sliding bearing interposed between the shaft and the bearing portion. The bearing portion is formed of an aluminum-based material, the shaft is formed of a steel material, and the sliding bearing is formed of a copper-based material.

The invention relates to an exhaust turbocharger, which contains a modular bearing, which is designed for bearing a shaft and is arranged between a compressor and a turbine, wherein the bearing has a bearing housing having a receptacle chamber, wherein a bearing assembly module can be or is installed in the receptacle chamber and can be non-destructively removed, the receptacle chamber being sized such that optionally either a bearing assembly module having a rolling bearing or a bearing assembly module having a slide bearing can be installed, the receptacle chamber having an interface, which is designed to contact the bearing flange of a bearing assembly module inserted into the receptacle chamber, the interface being designed to connect an oil gallery passing through the bearing housing to one or more oil galleries passing through a bearing flange of the bearing assembly module.

A turbomachine includes: a rotational shaft; a pair of thrust collars disposed around the rotational shaft; a thrust bearing disposed around the rotational shaft at an axial directional position between the pair of thrust collars; and an oil-drain channel disposed around the rotational shaft, for draining lubricant oil after lubricating a sliding portion between the thrust bearing and the thrust collars. The oil-drain channel includes: an oil-drain port portion for discharging the lubricant oil inside the oil-drain channel downward; and an oil-guide channel portion disposed above the oil-drain port portion and configured to guide the lubricant oil from the sliding portion in a circumferential direction of the rotational shaft to the oil-drain port portion. The oil-guide channel portion has an asymmetric shape with respect to a rotational direction of the rotational shaft, the oil-guide channel portion having a minimum flow-path cross sectional area at a first position on an upstream side in the rotational direction, and a maximum flow-path cross sectional area at a second position on a downstream side of the first position.

A bearing system and method may include a bearing element that may have a first surface. A mating element may have a second surface that may face the first surface. A fluid film interface may be defined between the first and the second surfaces. The mating element may rotate about an axis and relative to the bearing element. An axial direction may be defined parallel to the axis. A radial direction may be defined perpendicular to the axis. The first surface may have a profile that may vary in the axial direction and that may varies in the radial direction. The profile may direct a fluid present in the fluid film interface in a direction or directions having circumferential and/or axial components.