(ATHENS, Greece) — Thordon Bearings will attend next week’s Posidonia to showcase a range of environmentally-safe polymer bearing technologies from its maritime product portfolio.
With increasing market awareness and demand for its COMPAC seawater-lubricated propeller shaft bearing, the Canada-based manufacturer will use Posidonia to highlight the environmental and cost-saving advantages of its ThorPlas-Blue range of grease-free polymer bearings in deck machinery.
ThorPlas-Blue can be applied to all lifeboat and tender davit systems; fairleads, which can have a huge impact on mooring ropes that wear quickly; tiller arms and jockey bars; cranes and hoists; pivot point bushings; winches, capstans, watertight doors and hatches.
“Aside from the obvious safety and environmental benefits, use of the ThorPlas-Blue product facilitates a smoother, more reliable operation of deck machinery since seized bearings from inadequate greasing is no longer an issue,” said Scott Groves, Thordon Bearings’ business development manager.
“This also reduces operational costs, given that a seized bearing would often result in the need to replace expensive rope or cables. Piston and cylinder damage and subsequent mechanical failure arising from increased levels of vibration is also avoided. Shipowners also save on the costs associated with the purchase, storage and disposal of grease,” he said.
Greek shipowner Minerva Marine, which replaced the greased bronze mooring winch bearing with ThorPlas-Blue aboard the 58,156-gt crude oil tanker Minerva Hellen, is now planning to apply the grease-free alternative to other vessels in the fleet.
Superintendent engineer Dimitrios Mastorakis said, “Since replacing the bronze bearing more than two years ago we have eliminated the costs and maintenance associated with the constant application of grease. We are very pleased with the ThorPlas-Blue product and plan to use it on other vessels.”
ThorPlas-Blue bearings can be easily machined and installed quickly into a variety of applications where greased bronze bearings are traditionally installed. They can also be supplied as a split spherical bearing (SSB) for use in rudder and steering gear systems to counter the alignment problems typical of hydraulic steering systems.
Visitors to Posidonia 2016 will be able to find out more about both COMPAC and ThorPlas-Blue by visiting Thordon Bearings in Booth 3.111 with their Greek distributor, Technava.
