Keyless Locking Devices Eliminate the Need for Keyways in the Oil & Gas Industry
Climax Keyless Locking Devices used in place of keyways when mounting shaft components for manufacturing cold rolled steel and welded pipes eliminate fretting and associated equipment damage.
Traditionally, manufacturers of cold rolled steel and welded pipes in gas transmission use multiple hydraulic motors to drive the steel conveying rolls. These hydraulic motors are typically mounted onto a shaft with the use of keyways. The application subjects the motor/shafting to frequent and severe shock loading which causes a systemic problem of keyway failure. Due to reverse bending moment, the slip fit rigid flanged coupling with a standard keyway and two set screws often faces issues such as fretting, resulting in catastrophic failures. These failures cause the manufacturer unnecessary expenses in damaged equipment, including extensive labor and loss of production.
Climax Metal Products decided to look for alternate solutions to prevent keyway failures. Climax Series C600 Keyless Rigid Couplings with a step-bore inner ring provides this solution. A Climax Keyless Rigid Coupling creates a high pressure high capacity mechanical interference fit that eliminates the “slop” from the connection while providing the reassurance that a keyway failure is avoided. Additionally, the zero backlash connection is unaffected by (more…)
Timing Solutions for Steel Mill Production Lines
Climax Keyless Locking Assemblies provide timing solutions for steel mill production lines providing a cost-effective and maintenance-friendly alternative to traditional keyed connections.
Traditional methods used to mount mechanical power transmission components in steel mills, incorporate the use of gears and keyways. After some time these keyed connections begin to deteriorate causing components to become out of sync, resulting in maintenance issues and downtime consequently affecting the production and profitability of the mill.
The hot rolled bar production line in a steel mill has gears in the transfer station for lifting the hot metal bars. These gear/lifting arm combinations demand strict sync tolerances in order for the transfer process to run smoothly. Eventually as these arms pick up and transfer large quantities of very long steel bars, the keyed connection is compromised, causing the lifting arms to lose synchronization and production to be halted. This need to periodically re-align the gears and/or replace expensive keyed shafting is often very expensive, difficult, and time consuming. (more…)
