Resilient, Reliable, Relentless - Bearings for Harsh Environments
In industries where operating conditions are extreme, bearing performance and reliability can be absolutely key to a company’s success.
Across sectors like quarrying and mining, steelmaking and cement, bearings must endure heavy loads, shocks and vibration, as well as putting up with high levels of contamination and extreme temperatures, all without compromising performance.
At NSK Europe, we specialise in developing and manufacturing bearing solutions that excel under such harsh conditions, helping our customers to reduce their downtime and maintenance costs whilst also maximising their efficiency, productivity and profitability.
The Cost of Failure
Bearings failures can pose significant challenges even in controlled industrial environments.
Poor lubrication, ingress of contaminants or poor installation, to pick just three of many possible examples, can lead directly to unplanned downtime and unscheduled maintenance. This can be costly and logistically challenging and further compounded when the same thing happens in remote or difficult to access environments.
Mines and quarries are one obvious example. They are the definition of a harsh or aggressive environment, where bearings have to withstand extreme strain, but they’re also often located in hard-to-reach areas. As a result, any bearing failures can directly result in extended downtime not thanks to the failure itself, but from the delays in obtaining replacement components.
Heavy vibration is a standard challenge in the quarrying sector, particularly for machinery like vibrating screens and crushers.
One quarry we worked with experienced bearing failures on their vibrating screen machinery at least twice a year, with every failure causing a full day of downtime. The cause: load-related stress, lubrication degradation, and contamination ingress.
As a solution, we recommended our VS Series of bearings, made from our proprietary High-Tough (HTF) Steel, and engineered specifically to withstand the harsh working environments and frequent vibrations found in the mining, quarrying and construction industries.
Our HTF Steel offers superior fatigue life and resistance to wear-and-tear, heat, and seizure, which come together to offer up to seven times the lifespan you would expect from conventional bearings when exposed to contaminated lubrication.
In this particular instance, the company found that the VS Series bearings lasted three times as long as their predecessors, significantly reducing downtime and improving efficiency. The result was a significant uptake in productivity and annual savings of €47,000 thanks to reduced part and maintenance costs.
Steelmaking is another sector where the list of potential challenges can sometimes feel endless.
Day in, day out, bearings have to stand up to particulate contamination, the heavy loads, shock loads, strong vibrations, rapid acceleration and deceleration, and extreme temperatures. There is also another factor that comes into play here, however, water.
Water can have a significant impact on the life expectancy of a bearing. For instance, as little as 0.1% water ingress will reduce bearing life to 25% of what it should be. Just 1% will see a four-year lifespan reduced to just three months.
Fortunately, there are things you can do to prevent water ingress. For example, in a cold rolling mill, one European steelmaker struggled with unexpected bearing failures every few months due to water and particulate contamination.
NSK responded by recommending its Super-Tough (STF) Steel spherical roller bearings. Engineered specifically to combat contamination-induced wear and seizure, STF bearings deliver up to 10 times the service life of standard bearings in contaminated lubrication and four times longer at operating temperatures up to 160°C.
Following the implementation, the steelmaker was able to move from quarterly emergency replacements to annual scheduled maintenance, translating into cost savings of approximately €14,000 per year.
Contamination is one of the most common causes of bearing failure as it disrupts the conditions the components need to operate smoothly and reliably.
This makes cement manufacturing sites, with their overabundance of dust, moisture and corrosive materials, a perfect storm for bearing failure. Fortunately, there are steps you can take to protect your vital components, steps which NSK has plenty of experience in taking.
For example, we worked with one company where the bearings were failing on its concrete pipe slotting machine every two to three months, resulting in eight hours of downtime per incident. Following a site visit, our engineers determined that the root cause was that the shielded deep groove ball bearings being used weren’t able to keep out fine concrete dust which was infiltrating the lubrication.
Our solution was NSK Molded-Oil Bearings with DDU contact seals. Molded-Oil Bearings have been specifically designed for corrosive and dust-contaminated environments. Available in ball, spherical roller, and tapered roller formats, Molded-Oil bearings incorporate a solid polymer matrix that releases lubricant in a controlled manner. This mechanism not only ensures consistent lubrication but also seals out contaminants and eliminates the need for relubrication.
The upgrade extended bearing life from mere months to over a year, delivering annual cost savings of approximately €33,000 for the customer.
Bearings might be small, but they are an integral part of your operations.
Bearings failure can have catastrophic effects on productivity, reliability, and your bottom line. This is doubly true in harsh environments, and it is essential that you collaborate with a supplier able to offer high-performance bearing solutions engineered specifically for the world’s toughest environments.
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