Hydrostatic circular thrust pad with restrictor choice

Load capacity, stiffness, flow rate and pump power for a circular hydrostatic thrust pad, with a choice of capillary, orifice or fixed-flow restrictor — after the hydrostatic bearings of the Prins Willem-Alexander locks in Amsterdam.

✓ validated against legacyoriginal: /calculators/e13_31.htm

Pad outer radius, R₀10⁻³ mRecess/pad radius ratio, R₁/R₀Film thickness, h₀10⁻³ mViscosity, ηPa·sSupply pressure, p_s10⁵ PaPressure ratio, β₀Restrictor type

Effective/pad area ratio, A_E/A0.7149366792745678

Load, F* = β₀·A_E/A0.421812640771995

Stiffness, S*0.7359284370915656

Flow, Q*0.8661199303533398

Load capacity, F253.98083515282732 10³ N

Stiffness, S4431.15499628337 10⁶ N/m

Flow rate, Q1.2125679024946758 liter/s

Pump power, N1.6975950634925463 kW

Pressure ratio, β₀ (as used)0.59

Method & references

Default values are based on the hydrostatic bearings of the Prins Willem-Alexander locks in Amsterdam.
For a fixed-flow restrictor the pad always operates at β₀=1, independent of the entered pressure-ratio value.

The computation is a literal port of the original client-side JavaScript from /calculators/e13_31.htm. Results are verified equal to the original by an automated golden-master test. No formula has been re-derived or “improved”.

Hydrostatic circular thrust pad with restrictor choice — Engineering ABC