79 L~ST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 1. Elastic Hysteresis 2. Overdamped Vibration 3. Critically Damped Vibration 4. Underdamped Vibration 5. Optimum Damping Factor for Specified Error 6. Free Gyroscope 7. Inclined Plane 8. Sliding Shoe 9. Kingsbury Thrust :Bearing 10. Circular Pad Air :Bearing 11. Cylindrical Pad 12. Oil-Ring-Bearing 13. Lo\-T Friction Ball :Bearing 14. Low Friction Roller Bearing 15. Sec...

Air bearings are used in precision machines and measurement equipments for recently years. Unlike conventional ball or roll bearings, there is no physical contact between the sliding surfaces and the moving surface. Therefore, the structure with air bearings can glide smoothly on the other surface to avoid generating the small particles from the friction contact and also minimize the control ef...

In this paper, we build an air conveyor with newly developed vortex bearing elements, and study the flotation precision of the front-end of the substrate in quasi-static flotation transport. We experimentally discuss the three influential factors: air supply pressure, thickness of the substrates and installing direction of the vortex bearing element. We find that during the process of transport...

This paper provides an overview of air-bearing spacecraft simulators. Air bearings have been used for satellite attitude determination and control hardware verification and software development for nearly 45 years. Honeywell Space Systems and Virginia Tech are each developing unique new facilities. During their development, we have become interested in the history of this technology: how early ...