Beauchamp Tower

Beauchamp Tower - Alison Avery
Part of the Tower of London castle

I am trying to figure out just how air bearings work and I come across an engineer by the name of Beauchamp Tower, but when I Google him, I get the Tower of London. Huh, don't suppose there is any connection do you?

Kingsbury Tilting Pad Thrust Bearing

Beauchamp (the engineer) is chiefly known for his discovery of hydrodynamic lubrication. Kingsbury used this knowledge to develop the Tilting Pad Thrust Bearing.  The pads are mounted on pivots and due to magic, the trailing edge tilts toward the bearing surface, but because of oil magic, they never make contact.

Near as I can tell, these bearings were originally developed for propeller shafts for big ships and are still in use today. They can support loads of 100 tons, which is kind of what you need when you want to push a gazillion ton ship through the water at 20 knots. I mean the propellers are generating the necessary thrust, but you really need to to transfer that thrust to the hull of the ship. Hence, you need a big-ass thrust bearing.

This whole air bearing thing is a bit opaque. There is a lot of mumbo jumbo about how they work, but I haven't found any kind of clear explanation of the principles involved, which leads me to suspect that either a) they don't really know, or b) it's some kind of quantum effect, which means it may as well be magic.