Power plant products |
Rolls-Royce develops energy saving new bearing
The Rolls-Royce business unit Power Systems has developed a sliding bearing for its mtu range of engines that is said to reduce their fuel consumption by 1%.
The new bearing significantly reduces the friction between bearing and crankshaft and also enables prediction of when maintenance will next be required. “This is an innovation with huge potential, because the new bearings can simply replace the existing bearings in a whole range of applications,” said Thekla Walker, environment minister of Baden- Württemberg, at a ceremony on 4 November to mark the award of the Baden-Württemberg Environmental Technology Prize to R-R for its achievement in developing the new bearing. The bearing surface, instead of being entirely smooth, is furnished with fine grooves, which, together with the lubricant, produce an acquaplaning-like effect that functions as an anti-friction layer. This layer reduces the friction losses arising between crankshaft and bearing by 20-35%, depending on the operating mode. The bearing can also indicate when the next major maintenance will be due by producing
a change in the sound signature that can be interpreted accordingly.
The new bearing is the result of a collaborative effort between a small project team in Friedrichshafen, bearing manufacturer Miba, and the MontanUniversität Leoben in Austria. “The technology behind sliding bearings is very mature and very well established and to genuinely improve it you need outstanding engineering expertise and innovative talent. So we’re very proud that along with our partners, we’ve succeeded in developing an optimised metal slide bearing that can be installed in our engines without the need for further modification”, commented Dr Otto Preiss, COO and CTO at Rolls-Royce Power Systems. mtu engines are to be fitted with the new bearing in the near future, while engines already in service will be progressively retro- fitted in the course of routine overhauls. The bearing, for which a patent is pending, is also suitable for use in engines other than mtu units from Rolls-Royce, and the company intends to market it via Miba AG as an individual component. “It is suitable for all equipment
in which sliding bearings must withstand high loads – for example utility vehicle engines, turbines and wind power plants – which, thanks to the new bearing, can go into operation a little more quickly than before and are therefore productive for longer,” commented Dr Thomas Kottke, who is heading the project.
Giant chimney sections for Australia’s first WTE plant
At the end of September, the 19 000 ton heavy lift multipurpose vessel, the AAL Nanjing, loaded four large chimney sections, with a combined weight of close to 500 tonnes and 6000 cubic metres in size. The units were manufactured and loaded in Humen, China, and shipped long-haul along AAL Shipping’s ‘Asia – West Coast Australia Monthly Liner Service’ to Henderson in Australia for installation at the Kwinana waste-to-energy plant – the first thermal utility-scale WTE facility in the country.
The AUD $700 million Kwinana plant will create 800 jobs and is located 40 km south of Perth. It will process 486 000 tonnes of industrial and
domestic waste every year to generate 36 MW of renewable bioenergy and avoid 486 000 tonnes of CO2
emissions emitted by Western Australia’s electricity grid.
Jack Zhou, general manager of AAL China, commented, “AAL is a heavy lift project cargo specialist, so our engineering and operations teams were more than capable of planning and handling this operation – despite the extreme size of these units.
“In fact, the issues we did face were mostly due to local Chinese COVID restrictions, creating port congestion, slow productivity and unavoidable delays of anything up to two weeks. Heavy lifting
operations of this kind require many hands- on-deck to assist with executing the complex shackling, lashing and stowage plan. On this occasion, local stevedores were not permitted to embark the vessel, and this caused delays and cost far more time and energy for our crew than would normally have been required.” Frank Mueller, general manager of AAL Australia, commented, “Like the rest of the multipurpose sector, AAL is facing pressure and incentives from container shippers to carry yet more containers on our ‘mega-size’ vessels, to fill the gap left by container carriers and RoRo operators.”
54 | November/December 2021 |
www.modernpowersystems.com
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