False Brinelling in Rolling-element Bearings: How Can You Prevent It?

Healthy bearings in industrial equipment are of paramount importance to prevent unwanted machine failure, downtime, and catastrophic disasters. When you maintain and care for your equipment well, the bearings can last for a long time. One way of taking good care of your industrial equipment, especially the rolling-element bearings, is to understand the issues that affect them, and the most common is false brinelling.  This post takes a closer look at false brinelling to help you understand what it is and how to prevent it. 

What is False Brinelling? 

Brinelling is defined as permanent indentation of a surface. Brinelling in bearings happens when the internal raceways get damaged permanently. These indentations can rapidly degenerate into improper functioning of equipment, including excessive vibrations that can easily accelerate other types of tearing, especially galling and spalling. Brinelling can be classified into two, false and true brinelling. 

• True Brinelling

This is caused by excessive loads because of improper mounting, dropping the equipment, and excessive impact loads during operation cycles. You can notice true brinelling through regularly-spaced indentations on the raceways. Your shaft and equipment, such as a motor or pump, will also have more vibrations. 

• False Brinelling

This is mainly caused by vibrations acting on the bearing. In non-rotating equipment, the problem is caused by poor storage or transportation. Common signs of false brinelling are depressions and notable wear marks on the bearing raceway. Ultimately, the depressions result in noise, fatigue, and bearing failure. 

Another common cause of false brinelling is contamination. If hard particles get on the raceways, they can reduce the size of the path or cause the rolling elements to exert more pressure on specific points where they occur. This is why you should always ensure the bearings are installed in a clean environment. 

How to Prevent False Brinelling  

The basic principle of preventing false brinelling is to stop vibrations and cease the rocking motion. You can achieve this by utilizing vibration isolators in your equipment and tightening contacts to enhance friction with more loads. Other causes of vibration that you should focus on include shaft misalignment and correct loading. Therefore, it might be a good idea to start by carrying vibration analysis to determine the level of vibrations and causes.  

Another method you can apply to prevent false brinelling is preventing the bearings from resting on the same point for a long period. This is achieved by continuously or occasionally rotating your equipment bearing uniformly. Rotation helps to distribute the wear uniformly on the entire raceway. Because the boundary lubrication is already in action, anti-wear additives can help to reduce wear. 

Whether your equipment is used for industrial or domestic purposes, it is paramount to strictly follow the manufacturer’s guide, especially on installation, maintenance, and lubrication. For example, you should replace the lubricant as soon as it gets used up to ensure it can help to keep the rolling elements moving smoothly when the bearings are being used. 

As you can see, false brinelling is a serious threat to equipment performance and can easily result in failure and unexpected downturns. Therefore, make sure the bearings are carried well, installed without exposing them to contamination, and vibrations kept at the lowest possible level.