Patent ID: 6945833

Claim:
A fluid thrust apparatus which comprises: a flow-through housing having a fluid inlet at one and a fluid outlet nozzle at the opposite end and a central axial pod mounted within the flow-through housing, a first portion of said pod comprising a fixed hub supported in the housing and surrounded by an annular fluid flow passage and a second portion of said hub comprising an impeller fixed to a drive shaft with an end of said drive shaft rotatably mounted within said fixed hub, said impeller being adapted to force fluid through the annular fluid flow passage and out through the outlet nozzle, and bearing means within said fixed hub for supporting the drive shaft including an axially mounted sleeve bearing and at least one thrust bearing adapted to engage a radial face of a radial flange fixed to said drive shaft, said thrust bearing comprising an annular multi-layer plate including a metallic core layer with a front layer of polymeric marine bearing material fixed to one side thereof and a resilient backing layer fixed to the other side thereof, said back layer being formed of a resilient polymeric material and having sufficient resilience to permit corrective alignment of the thrust bearing in response to misalignment or by unevenly distributed thrust.