These last decades numerous model for airfoil bearings have been developed. But nowadays, these models are not sufficiently accurate for the rotor response prediction in the presence of non linearities. It is essential for the future developments to control the instabilities due to the non linear behavior in order to quantify the energy dissipation in the bearings. By means of a variational approach, the flexible structure is modeled as a thin media subjected to a compressible fluid pressure, isothermal and in a laminar then turbulent regime. The model is built up using FEM for the foils response. the internal dry friction is taken into account with Coulomb’s law and the updated Lagrangian method. The structure model is coupled with Reynolds equation to calculate the rotor motions, thanks to the basic principle of dynamics (B.P.D). This work is performed, first, to put in evidence the influence of thin structure approach on the rotor behavior and on the field pressure. The link between bumps deflections and dry friction is established. The structure buckling is twice increased by the phenomenon of friction between sheets and energy dissipation. The second objective is to identify the subsynchronous frequencies in order to establish the relevance of the new airfoil model for non linear and instabilities investigations.
