Failure Analysis & Advice on Roller Bearings in Rotary Kilns

According to the on-site dismantling, the experts came up with the analysis result and proposed the solution. Due to the unreasonable bearing layout of the client's equipment, the verticality has long been in bad conditions and this resulted in uneven bearing forces, which caused a significant decrease in bearing life. The experts suggested replacing the original bearings with  alignable bearings.

After a rigorous test, the experts suggested that the client should change original bearings with spherical roller bearings as well as spherical roller thrust bearings. They also explained, “The shell temperature of a rotary kiln furnace can reach 400°C. This temperature can reduce the viscosity of the lubricant in the bearings and eventually lead to failure. More importantly, the constant tumbling load, dust and outdoor conditions can lead to shaft misalignment, bearing contamination and other failures. In the face of this situation, spherical roller bearings and spherical roller thrust bearings are better choices...”

“Our spherical roller bearings, which have high load carrying capacity and ability to adapt to misalignment, can deal with high axial loads and radial loads and can be in the applications prone to axis shifts or misalignment. Meanwhile, spherical roller bearings can permit rotation with low friction and angular misalignment. With these characters, spherical roller bearings can help obtain low maintenance costs and thus ensure a long life. What’s more, spherical roller thrust bearings are proper. The reason is that spherical roller thrust bearings are quite the perfect combination of specially designed raceways as well as asymmetrical rollers. They can bear not only axial loads from one direction but also simultaneously acting radial loads... The two kinds of roller bearings are uniquely designed to manage both thrust and radial loads on the rotating shaft and housing...”