An unconditional existence result for elastohydrodynamic piezoviscous lubrication problems with Elrod-Adams model of cavitation

Abstract

An unconditional existence result of a solution for a steady fluid-structure problem is stated. More precisely, we consider an incompressible fluid in a thin film, ruled by the Reynolds equation coupled with a surface deformation modelled by a nonlinear non local Hertz law. The viscosity is supposed to depend nonlinearly on the fluid pressure. Due to the apparition of a mushy region, the two-phase flow satisfies a free boundary problem defined by a pressure-saturation model. Such a problem has been studied with simpler free boundaries models (variational inequality), or with boundary conditions imposing small data assumptions. We show that up to a realistic hypothesis on the asymptotic pressure-viscosity behaviour it is possible to obtain an unconditional solution of the problem.