Editorial

Quality Bearings & Components (QBC) announces a new line of 303 stainless steel solid precision ground shafting. Identified as the BBSHAF... Series, these shafts are stocked in 3 diameters, .1247", .1872", and .2497".

They are available in lengths ranging from 1" to 36". They feature 1/64" x 45o chamfer at both ends and straightness of .0004 per inch. Quotes plus online orders are available at our new QBC eStore.

QBC has in stock: miniature bearings, plastic bearings, rod end bearings, spherical bearings, pillow blocks, sintered bronze bushings, radial ball bearings, thrust bearings & washers, sleeve bearings, needle bearings, inner races, roller clutches, guide wheels & rail systems, linear ball bearings, inner and outer ring spacers and shafting. 

By replacing standard solid bearings with split cylindrical or spherical roller bearings, process manufacturers can reduce repair and overhaul costs on complex drive units for heavy machinery, including steel rolling mills and extruders.

For process manufacturing companies, replacing worn or damaged bearings on drive units for heavy machinery is both time consuming and costly. Repair and overhaul of components soaks up valuable time and resources, often resulting in costly production downtime, while the equipment or machinery is offline being repaired. The harsh operating environment can also mean more regular maintenance being required on machinery.

In the steel industry, for example, split bearings can replace sliding bearings to support the heavy universal joint drive shafts on large rolling mills. For a typical rolling mill, the work rolls are driven by universal joint drive shafts. After every rolling cycle, the height of the rolls is adjusted. The drive shafts have to follow this adjusting movement and so are fitted with universal joints. Due to this height adjustment, the shaft length also varies, which must be compensated for in a coupling sleeve.

A practical example involves a recent project at a wastewater treatment plant in Cleveland that needed realistic cold alignment targets for a 3600 rpm compressor.

This machine had a long history of coupling and bearing failures. Over a two-year period several attempts were made to calculate the thermal growth on the motor and compressor supports. The original equipment manufacturer's (OEM) technical manual gave a vertical thermal offset value of +0.04 in. (+40 mils). There were no recommendations for a target vertical angularity. Horizontal alignment changes were not mentioned.

There was some confusion with the OEM targets as provided. Maintenance personnel did not know if this value represented what the rim dial indicator should read when the cold alignment was completed (with a dial indicator mounted on the stationary shaft and indicating the motor coupling). Dial indicators indicate the total indicated runout (TIR) each time the shaft is rotated 180 deg. Half of the TIR represents the actual centerline offset; therefore the target should actually be +20 mils vertical offset.

In the UK, current estimates indicate that the grey market for bearings accounts for between 12 and 15 per cent of total UK bearing sales. Not only does a growing grey market open up routes for more counterfeit products to enter the market, it also puts end users and distributors at greater risk of costly breakdowns, litigation and void warranties.

How do purchasers of bearings actually know that the products they are buying are genuine and will perform as well as they say on the datasheet? Most don

The FAG range of split spherical roller bearings from Schaeffler UK, not only helps heavy industries such as metals production, paper and pulp manufacturing, mining, quarrying and cement companies reduce production downtime, but also simplifies mounting and helps reduce assembly and maintenance costs. 

Replacing or removing damaged or worn parts on heavy machinery and equipment that requires regular servicing or maintenance, can be a real headache for manufacturing companies, particularly those in the mining, quarrying and mineral processing sector, where the value of capital equipment and production machinery is normally high.

Repair and overhaul of components soaks up valuable time and resources, often resulting in costly production downtime, while the equipment or machinery is offline being repaired. The harsh operating environment may also result in more regular maintenance and overhaul being required on machinery.

 

For several years R. A. Rodriguez has marketed the UNITEC brand of ballscrew support bearings designed for high performance machine tool applications. Now in addition to the high load and exceptional performance capabilities of this needle roller bearing range, the company has introduced a new range of ball bearings to meet more general high precision needs of ballscrews.

Sourced from the R. A. Rodriguez German facility, the DRF/DRN double row ball bearings for screw drives are high precision components with a contact angle of 60

The Schaeffler Group has developed an innovative, energy efficient four-row, angular contact ball bearing, which replaces conventional tapered roller wheel bearings, resulting in reduced fuel consumption and emissions on trucks, SUVs and light vans, but which potentially could be developed for use in other heavy engineering applications

By replacing

A condition-monitoring program based on ultrasonics can catch problems before they turn into catastrophes, and can find leaks that could be costing you money.

An effective condition-monitoring program provides many benefits, ranging from improved asset availability to reduced energy consumption. One primary focus of condition monitoring is the status of bearings, whose health (or lack of it) can mean the difference between meeting production goals and causing chaos. Should even a single bearing fail, the consequences can be damaged equipment and product, a production run stopped, parts that must be ordered for repairs, and considerable man-hours wasted.

A program for monitoring bearing condition need not be extremely complicated, nor does it necessarily require a large investment of capital to get it going. One technology that is both cost-effective and relatively easy to incorporate in such a program is air-borne/structure-borne ultrasound.

At service ceilings of up to 15,000 meters, maximum speeds of 2,000 kilometers per hour, rates of climb of 12,000 meters per minute and under extreme pressures, the seal on the jet fighter cockpit presents the ultimate sealing challenge. Even a pinprick in the seal between the cockpit and the plane could put the pilot