HPGRs and roller presses operate in challenging environments with virtually inevitable dirt ingress and bearing grease loss. A common maintenance practice for open bearings is to purge the bearings with grease – increasing costs, as well as health and safety risks for maintenance personnel. And what’s more, since these assets are crucial for production processes, any downtime can lead to costly manufacturing stops.
What if you could find a solution to keep lubrication in and contamination out?
The sealed SKF Explorer spherical roller bearing provides longer meantime between failure and are therefore a long-term investment for increased machine availability and reliability. Instead of having to stop production for predictive maintenance of the bearing, the wear of the roller press roller becomes the determining factor for when to perform service. Additionally, lubrication consumption can be reduced by 95% with sealed bearings.
The sealed SKF Explorer spherical roller bearing provides doubled service life compared to open bearings. Additionally, they can possibly be remanufactured – twice.
Double bearing service life with large size
sealed spherical roller bearings
Sealed SKF Explorer spherical roller bearings make maintenance easier and operations more efficient, but that’s just the beginning of the story.
Learn how the positive effects can quickly spreadacross your business:
Costs
Longer bearing service life and fewer maintenance interactions means reduced Total Cost of Ownership (TCO).
Productivity
Sealed and correctly fitted bearings with longer service life, contribute to longer mean time between failures and increased HPGR productivity.
Availability
The wear of the roller press roller becomes the limiting factor for servicing, instead of stopping production for preventive maintenance.
Safety
Fewer maintenance interventions can help reduce risk of injuries to staff.
Environment
Reduced grease consumption, purging and pollution can help you cut your environmental footprint.
Innovation
Extended time between service intervals can enable the adoption of predictive maintenance programmes.
How do sealed SKF spherical roller bearings
reduce total cost of ownership?
Discover how by answering the following four questions
Q1: How much longer is the average bearing service life of a sealed spherical roller bearing compared to an open bearing?
Q2: How much can you expect to reduce grease consumption by using a sealed spherical roller bearing instead of an open bearing?
Q3: What is the largest bore size available in the sealed SKF spherical roller bearing range?
Q4: Up to how many times can sealed SKF spherical roller bearings be remanufactured?
How mounting affects bearing performance
Large bearings are challenging to mount. Incorrect fit on the shaft has proven to be another common cause of
bearing failure and with the inner and outer ring sensitive to swivelling, careful mounting is essential.
SKF offers specialised tools that facilitate installations.
Withdrawal sleeves
All SKF 241 series bearings for roll presses and HPGRs can be mounted with the aid of a matching withdrawal sleeve. The sleeves can be used with both standard and sealed bearings.
SKF Drive-Up Method
The drive-up method is a reliable and accurate method for mounting medium and large size bearings. Importantly, it is ideal for sealed bearings, since removing the seal to use feeler gauges is not advisable. It is also consistently faster and more accurate than using a feeler gauge and requires no special training.
We also offer on-site mounting services, and the bearings can be sold as a stand-alone solution, or as part of a broader SKF Rotation Equipment Performance programme , along with SKF greases, lubrication system, and machine health monitoring services.
Calculate the potential savings for your own site
Our calculators will help you see whether switching to sealed bearings would be profitable for your own site – based on your own operational data.
One calculates the saving in grease costs; the other estimates your overall Return on Investment (ROI).
Expert view: Maintenance
Expert view: Operations
Learn more about sealed SKF Explorer spherical roller bearings
Continual development for optimal performance
The range for large size sealed spherical roller bearings has been extended to meet the needs of roller presses and HPGR machines, up to and including 1250mm bore. Take a closer look at the range and its capabilities in our brochure.