This book starts with the invention of the wheel nearly 5000 years ago, and via Archimedes, Aristotle and Hero describes the first practical applications such as water wheels and grinding wheels, pushing on to more rigorous scientific research by inquiring minds such as Leonardo da Vinci and Copernicus in later ages. Newton and Leibniz followed, and beam structures received maximum attention three centuries ago. As focus shifts and related disciplines such as mathematics and physics also develop, slowly turbomachines and rotor and blade dynamics as we know the subject now take shape.
While the book traces the events leading to Laval and Parsons Turbines, the emphasis is on rotor and blade dynamics aspects that pushed these turbines to their limits in the last century. The tabular and graphical methods developed in the pre-computer era have taken different form in the last fifty years through finite element methods. The methods evolved in the last century are discussed in detail to help modern day designers and researchers.
This book will be useful to young researchers and engineers in industry and educational institutions engaged in rotor and blade dynamics work in understanding the past and the present developments and what is expected in future. Faculty and industry engineers can benefit from this broad perspective history in formulating their developmental plans.
History of Rotating Machinery Dynamics HISTORY OF MECHANISM AND MACHINE SCIENCE Volume 20 Series Editor MARCO CECCARELLI Aims and Scope of the Series This book series aims to establish a well defined forum for Monographs and Proceedings on the History of Mechanism and Machine Science (MMS). The series publishes works that give an overview of the historical developments, from the earliest times up to and including the recent past, of MMS in all its technical aspects. This technical approach is an essential characteristic of the series. By discussing technical details and formulations and even reformulating those in terms of modern formalisms the possibility is created not only to track the historical technical developments but also to use past experiences in technical teaching and research today. In order to do so, the emphasis must be on technical aspects rather than a purely historical focus, although the latter has its place too. Furthermore, the series will consider the republication of out-of-print older works with English translation and comments. The book series is intended to collect technical views on historical developments of the broad field of MMS in a unique frame that can be seen in its totality as an Encyclopaedia of the History of MMS but with the additional purpose of archiving and teaching the History of MMS. Therefore the book series is intended not only for researchers of the History of Engineering but also for professionals and students who are interested in obtaining a clear perspective of the past for their future technical works. The books will be written in general by engineers but not only for engineers. Prospective authors and editors can contact the series editor, Professor M. Ceccarelli, about future publications within the series at: LARM: Laboratory of Robotics and Mechatronics DiMSAT – University of Cassino Via Di Biasio 43, 03043 Cassino (Fr) Italy E-mail:
[email protected] For other titles published in this series, go to www.springencom/series/748l J.S. Rao History of Rotating Machinery Dynamics ABC J.S. Rao Altair Engineering Chief Science Officer Outer Ring Road 560103 Bangalore India E-mail: