Page 47: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (July 2020)

drum used two bearings, an SRB, and a CARB. The CARB helped to correct axial and radial misalignment. Overall, the total weight of the bearings was 28 tons, with the largest single bearing weighing eight tons.

While this is a unique order, it is not the first time that SKF has supplied bearings of such huge dimensions. Two years ago it supplied a three-ton sealed SRB to a copper mine in Peru.

Here, the sealed bearing was fitted to a horizontal shaft on a roller press, which operates in very dusty conditions.

SKF recently celebrated the centenary of the spherical roller bearing, which it introduced in 1919. Back then, the product was a completely new way to overcome angular misalignment in rotat- ing machinery, and available in a limited range of sizes. Despite the many changes to spherical roller bearings over the last 100 years, these latest SRBs, such as SKF’s very first one, will be pro- duced in Gothenburg, before being delivered to NOV in Poland.

www.marinelink.com 47