Excessive bearing as well as shaft wear leading to constant drydockings has actually led a Louisiana- based workboat driver to enhance functional competition as well as guarantee higher tools use by transforming to a Thordon RiverTo ugh tailshaft system.
While Thordon Bearings is not able to reveal the name of the driver, Thordon executed a RiverTo ugh birthing conversion to a twin-screw towboat operating on the reduced Mississippi with 6 ″ (152.4 mm) Aquamet size shafts as well as 6 ″ rubber bearings.
Thordon sales supervisor Jim Bright stated: “The increased tailshaft maintenance costs combined with lost charter days as the vessel required drydocking before its normal docking schedule led this particular operator to ask Thordon for recommendations on how best to reduce life cycle costs.”
“We are finding a lot of towboat owners, running rubber strut bearings directly on stainless steel or Aquamet shafts, are experiencing excessive shaft and bearing wear resulting in drydockings every 18 months or so, at significant cost.”
To enhance efficiency, the rubber bearings can be changed by Thordon’s RiverTo ugh which would certainly fix one concern yet Bright mentioned this would just deal with half the trouble, “the shafts would continue to wear as before”.
To fix this trouble as well as minimize versus the unpleasant impacts of the Mississippi River, it was determined that a Hardened non-corrosive NCB ThorSleeve would certainly be fit over the shafts. With the enhancement of ThorSleeves, the shaft would certainly have the ability to supply longer life to match the RiverTo ugh Bearings’ efficiency. However, this was not so simple due to the fact that the enhancement of the sleeve would certainly raise the shaft’s size to 6.5 ″ (165.1 mm).
“To accommodate the larger shaft diameter a larger bearing had to be installed,” statedBright “But fitting a larger bearing into a strut designed for a 6” (152.4 mm) bearing would certainly need a significant quantity of line boring as well as alteration job or the demand to totally change the strut, which in the past was the only method to undertake this type of job.
“Both of these options come with a high price tag making the upgrade hard to justify, so rather than modifying the struts, we found an alternative solution that cheated the laws of physics.”
Thordon’s design group developed a bearing that can suit the bigger shaft while suitable right into the initial real estate, without influencing the bearing efficiency or its unpleasant resistance top qualities.
“In effect we fitted a bearing designed to go in a housing for a 6.5″ (165.1mm) shaft into a housing designed for a 6″ (152.4mm) shaft. The solution saved approximately US$10,000 in line boring and machining work, while also giving the workboat operator a tailshaft bearing system capable of lasting for years rather than months.”
According to Jason Perry, Thordon Bearings’ Territory Sales Manager, the job is nearing conclusion at the dockyard of Ashton Marine LLC in Harvey, Louisiana as well as Thordon will certainly currently execute the very same procedure on a 2nd vessel in the driver’s eight-strong fleet.
“We will begin stocking this custom-sized bearing in their Gulf Coast Warehouse and are reviewing several other sizes to offer owners operating other size shafts,” he stated. “Cost effective solutions are a trademark for Thordon Bearings. We take the ‘work’ out of workboat.”
Sea News, June 24
