| Abstract: | Wall slip is often observed in a highly sheared fluid film in a solid gap. This makes a difficulty in mathematical analysis for the hydrodynamic effect because fluid velocity at the liquid–solid interfaces is not known a priori. If the gap has a convergent–divergent wedge, a free boundary pressure condition, i.e. Reynolds pressure boundary condition, is usually used in the outlet zone in numerical solution. This paper, based on finite element method and parametric quadratic programming technique, gives a numerical solution technique for a coupled boundary non‐linearity of wall slip and free boundary pressure condition. It is found that the numerical error decreases with the number of elements in a negative power law having an index larger than 2. Our method does not need an iterative process and can simultaneously gives rise to fluid film pressure distribution, wall slip velocity and surface shear stress. Wall slip always decreases the hydrodynamic pressure. Large wall slip even causes a null hydrodynamic pressure in a pure sliding solid gap. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. |
