Last month I started doing an application spotlight. In these, I’m going to pull from the dozens of phone calls or emails and walk you through how we on the Application Engineering team select a product for a specific application!
A customer called in with a tricky application where they need to keep the ID of a bearing cool. Seemed like a simple application, something where an air amplifier or a Super Air knife would be ideal!
But this wasn’t a simple application. They were heating the OD up, so they could add a surface treatment. The radiating heat was causing the inner race to slightly deform, so they wanted to cool it down, while not interrupting the heating taking place on the OD. And an air amplifier or knife would cool the entire bearing down with its larger pattern of air.
So we had to come up with an off-standard use for one of our products, and the first thought was our Back Blow Nozzles. The bearing ID was 2″, so we went with a 1006SS as it’s rated from 7/8″ to 4″. It was located, so the air stream was aimed downward. The airflow was hitting the ID and bouncing off the plate that the bearing sat on and worked its way out the top. This limited the air flow around the OD to basically zero, so it didn’t affect the coating process! Below is a quick sketch I did with the customer on the phone. It shows a section of the bearing and the air flow that would come from the back blow nozzle!
In more common applications, such as blowing chips or debris forward out of a pipe, our selection of forward blowing nozzles work quite well. However, this may not always be possible. The pipe may be long, making it impossible to push the debris all the way down the pipe. The other end of the pipe may not be open or there could be some process or area to which it is attached that would become contaminated if debris were blown in that direction. In any of these scenarios, a Back Blow Nozzle is the right tool for the job. An array of holes located around the outside diameter of the Back Blow Nozzle head provides a powerful 360° airflow pattern that will pull and clear out any leftover coolant or chips ahead of it within a pipe from a machining or any other process.
From the easy ID blow out application to the tricky “off book” applications, the application engineering team here at EXAIR are here to help you select the right product for you!
Jordan Shouse
Application Engineer
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Bearing Photo courtesy of Patrick via creative commons
