Longer life for automotive bearings

Longer life for automotive bearings

Longer life for automotive bearings

Keyword: Bearings

In the process of solving a recent specific customer problem, Nye Lubricants Inc. illustrated the fact that the life of a sintered bearing depends even more on its initial internal surface cleanliness than on the applied lubricant. An advanced examination and extraction technique on one obstinately noisy component (supplied by a desperate customer) showed that molecular coatings of manufacturing process oil inhibit the action of the applied lubrication oil and possibly promote its chemical degradation.

Following the success of this investigation, Nye have now established a proprietary examination and extraction protocol for initial pre-lubrication preparation of powdered metal bearings. This protocol is commercially available to Nye customers. The application of this preparation protocol allied with use of Nye's specialized oils for sintered bearings has delivered many advantages including quieter operation, lower vibration, reduced operating temperatures and very substantially increased operating life in automotive bearings.

Effectively the protocol is instigated by the customer supplying Nye with 50 to 100 clean samples of their new unlubricated sintered metal components for analysis. Nye can then propose an extraction, cleaning, preparation and lubrication protocol specific to that individual bearing.

Because this service calls for very high value lubricating equipment, and is labour intensive of high level engineering personnel, it tends to be restricted to high volume applications, mainly automotive.

Further information is available from Don Haydon at Electromotif. Tel: +44 (0) 20 8296 0650; Fax: +44 (0) 20 8296 0649; E-mail: info@electromotif.co.uk