Posted to News on 23rd Sep 2024, 14:30
Recipe for success
Choosing the right bearings and linear motion systems can make all the difference in harsh food and beverage environments, where machines and processes operate round-the-clock and where frequent washdowns occur. Preventing production downtime and extending the life of machines and equipment is the ultimate goal, says Tom Richmond, food and beverage sales engineer at Schaeffler UK.
(See Schaeffler at FoodManufacturing.Live, 15 May 2025, on stand 17)
Schaeffler looks at the food and beverage industry, from the design of its components as fit-for-purpose for the environment and the machinery they are working in, be it extremes of temperature, high mechanical loads, short cycle times, round-the-clock operation, as well as regular cleaning cycles.
Here, very robust components are required - for example, Schaeffler's food grade certified Radial Insert Ball Bearings, or special coatings on its linear products, through to its portfolio of lifetime solutions and services, all working together to eliminate machine failures.
Schaeffler's Radial Insert Ball Bearings provide the highest level of compliance with the food and beverage industry. Through several different steps, an example is a redesigned housing with solid cotter pins that help prevent build-up of contaminants and growth of bacteria, or the strength of the sealing arrangement, enabling the housing to withstand pressures up to 90 bar, which is important in environments where frequent washdowns occur.
Schaeffler supplies many types of bearings that are FDA-approved. FDA is one of the most stringent standards in the world, therefore it is relevant even in the UK market. However, it's not just about the bearings being FDA-approved; the grease inside the bearings is critical too. Having NSF H1 approved greases, as well as halal and kosher certification, are extremely important to the food and beverage industry.
Other bearing solutions
For food and beverage customers specifically, Schaeffler has the FOOD program offering, or FD series, comprising of rotary rolling bearings, as well as track rollers and deep groove ball bearings. These bearings ensure moving machine elements, such as axles and shafts, maintain their position.
Schaeffler also offers a broad range of linear motion products including shaft guidance systems, screw drives, monorail guides and linear actuators, as well as a variety of coatings to suit specific food and beverage applications. All of these products are food-grade certified.
Design and development
As a business, Schaeffler is constantly looking to develop innovative products that ensure a longer lifespan of a new machine. This is why the company is involved with customers at the design stage of new processes or machines, as well as helping them evolve their existing systems and processes. Schaeffler deals with the OEM market for new bearing products and helps them with proof of concept early in the design phase, in turn helping to increase the life of the new machine or equipment.
Schaeffler is also present in the MRO aftermarket, where it helps customers increase the longevity of ageing equipment and to help give them a true picture of the Total Cost of Ownership of specific products and/or applications. Schaeffler's Lifetime Solutions portfolio can provide condition monitoring, automatic lubricators, training, correct bearing fitting, and more.
Condition monitoring
OPTIME is just one of Schaeffler's condition monitoring solutions. It is cost effective, easily scalable, condition monitoring solution for single point vibration monitoring and analysis of rotating equipment. Being a wireless solution, it can measure different points on machines to ensure that they are running healthily with ease, compared to its hard-wired alternatives.
If there is a spike in temperature or vibration, for example, the system gives you a reading so you can physically look at the machine and make sure it's running correctly. OPTIME can be easily integrated into manufacturing control systems; PLC/SCADA/DCS via REST API software integration. It is compatible and can be used alongside other CM technologies to help give a holistic approach to improving machine uptime.
If OPTIME is not deemed suitable Schaeffler has other condition monitoring systems, such as SmartCheck which allows up to four measuring points to be monitored on a machine, or ProLink, a hard-wired condition monitoring solution allowing up to 16 measuring points, generally on slower-running ma-chines and critical plant.
The Lifetime Solutions portfolio is continuously expanding, bringing together Schaeffler's products to deliver fuller monitoring and maintenance solutions. For example, one of Schaeffler's latest developments is the OPTIME Ecosystem, a single solution that combines our OPTIME condition monitoring with our intelligent, interconnected automatic single point lubricator, OPTIME C1. And coming soon, OPTIME C4, a four-point version. These solutions create a cost-effective predictive maintenance solution, which minimises downtime and high maintenance costs.
In practice, by choosing bearing solutions from Schaeffler, food and beverage producers can benefit from extended production times and reduced failure probability for the bearing positions. Reduced downtimes increase productivity and reduce machine costs.
