Depending on the application, porous media air bearings may require air at pressures between 2 and 25 bar. 2 bar is typical for conveyor air bearings in transport applications; 4 to 6 bar for flat air bearings or bushings applied in precision applications with loads up to 15000N or more. Up to 25 bar is used for high pressure applications such as rolling road or tyre testing. Because the air flow is restricted by the porous media, the flow is significantly reduced over, for example, orifice bearings. The flow is indicated for all the air bearings we supply in Normal Litres Per Minute (NLPM) without load. This is the flow at standard conditions of temperature (293.15K) and pressure (1 bar/ 100kPa). Air flow through an air bearing gap is quite sensitive to the size of the gap, following a cubic function with relationship to the size of the gap. As an example, a 5cm diameter bearing with 34 kg of load would consume 1.57 NLPM at 5 microns of lift. For this bearing to carry the same load at 10 microns of lift, 25.18 NLPM. would be required. From this relationship, we can easily see how a smaller gap keeps the restriction high, reducing flow and power requirements.