NSK help reduce bearing costs for quarry operator

NSK’s Asset Improvement Programme (AIP) is said to have achieved bearing service 10 times longer and saved €2,970 annually on downtime and maintenance costs for a major quarry operator who had been experiencing frequent reliability problems with casting units assembled into a vibrating drum.

The reliability problems were resulting in bearing failures every two months or 440 hours of operation. They were caused by the severely wet and mechanically demanding environment in which the casting unit support bearings operated. The environment was. Worse still, the bearings were often exposed to large amounts of sand, which often covered them completely resulting in harsh abrasive ingress and subsequent premature
failure.
In addition to the problem of regular bearing failures, the bearings were difficult to access, thereby making replacement difficult. This complicated maintenance, including downtime, totalled €3,300 per year on one installation alone. The ongoing cost
and the sheer difficulty in maintaining the vibrating drum bearings meant that a long-term solution to the failure problem was required.

Engineers from NSK were called in to look at the installation and provide a resolution. The engineers visited the site as part of the AIP programme, which is designed to offer a value-added service for end-user bearing customers to help them reduce operating costs, improve efficiency and gain profitability. These objectives are achieved by delivering tangible savings to assets, such as equipment and machinery, and improving the working knowledge of maintenance and engineering personnel.

The NSK engineers proposed using self-lube triple-lip seals on the vibrating drum bearings. These seals provide maximum protection in applications with the highest degrees of contamination. The triple-lip seal consists of a one-piece moulded nitrile seal with three sealing lips, bonded to a protective steel outer pressing, which is robustly secured in the outer ring of the bearing.

This arrangement delivers a highly efficient sealing arrangement for use in the most demanding operating environments. According to NSK, the triple-lip seal solution has been a huge success with no failures in operation since installation. This has had a substantial effect on maintenance costs at the quarry, with annual spend on routine maintenance and downtime now calculated at just €330, producing an annual overall saving of €2,970.