This picture of a less-than-year-old coupling came in from the field.
It is a little blue/gray from removal heating.
However I think the wear on the outer edges of some of the hub teeth is very strange. It looks like the loop at the end of the grid was engaging the hub tooth, which should be impossible, unless the gap was set WAY too large, or maybe the wrong grid was installed.

Has anyone seen this before?

How about there was misalignment and the grid widened the main groove over time and as it does so the grid can now tilt within the groove. Tilted grid exiting the slot and moving under misalignment would polish the corner of the slot. I see some of the grooves on the very right side of the photo have this pattern of polished corner that seems to match this scenario. But the ones you're pointing to have an apparent wear pattern that seems to extend around the corner to flat side.... that's hard to figure.

I like your two explanations better than mine - gap too large or wrong grid.

I think both are correct. Combine incorrect coupling gap with some misalignment and don’t lube it correctly sounds like a perfect recipe for a coupling failure. It is not difficult to conclude that if someone does not know the importance of coupling gap to its reliability will know how to precisely align it. Since starting my own company after leaving my previous position with a large papermill, I have found the coupling sales people have done a good job of convincing many that when they use their couplings, you don’t have to worry about aligning the machines.
Just my opinion.

Have a happy holiday season.

Gary B

Dan,

This is a Falk Grid we took off of a vertical "C" faced installation. The coupling was on a Philadelphia gearbox (actually internal) I can see some of the same type of wear on this coupling if you look close at lower right hand side. I have better photo's on my work computer. The coupling gap was set correctly however the gap between the shaft ends was about two inches. The mechanics took most or all of this from the motor side and the key failed, destroying the motor shaft.

I don't know if you remember me but I worked with you for a short time at Lindskogs in 1996 before you left.

Keith Smith

Coupling.docx (732 KB, 80 downloads)

Hi Keith,

Let me run a quick test to see if I remember.
Yellow Mercedes SL ? How'd I do?


Could you post that picture in an older MS format, or maybe as some kind of image? Bill Gates is giving me a hard time about downloading a viewer for docx files.

I renamed it as zip. Then unzipped it. Then went looking around the resulting directory structure and found 3 images - I put those into attached pdf. If that's not the whole document, I hope Keith will let us know.

Coupling1.pdf (720 KB, 68 downloads)

Pete,
I am able to open Keith's docx file and your pdf file and both contain the same three images.

Ronnie

quote:

Pete,
I am able to open Keith's docx file and your pdf file and both contain the same three images.

What program does it take to open the "docx" file. It shows me it is zipped and when unzipping it, it just gives me jibberish.

My guess is 90% of members don't have a way to open some of these new versions of some of the older programs. Would be nice if all would post them in an older version. I think the new version have the ability to save in old versions format as well as open the old version but not so with the older versions.

Ralph,
You need Microsoft word 2007 to open docx files.
Regards
Irshad

Ralph,
Irshad is correct. We recently upgraded to the latest version of Microsoft Word 2007 and the file extension now have .docx instead of .doc. When I send a word file to someone who does not have the latest version of Word, I do a save as and save it as a .doc before sending it. Those who are posting .docx files here should do this so everyone can open them.

Ronnie

I think also that if you have the latest WinZip it will open as well.

quote:

Those who are posting .docx files here should do this so everyone can open them.

I totally agree Ronnie. Every member doesn't have the latest and "greatest" of all the new software (which, not unlike computers, change everyday, or so it seems).

I've got Word 2007 and I can't open that file either.

quote:

Originally posted by AKHTAR:
Ralph,
You need Microsoft word 2007 to open docx files.
Regards
Irshad

Microsoft let me download a docx reader bonus pack if I'm using Office 2003 or whatever. (I'm not). Last time I checked there was still no reader for MS Project, even though the earlier version of Project directed me to the MS website to fetch one. I'm sure every time I try to download one of his readers Bill Gates gets a popup notification on his monitor and bursts into laughter.

static.flickr.com/30/39555884_a577451621.jpg

My office v/2003. But, recently I purchased the latest WinZip available with all bells and really hadn't given thought but can use that extention both ways or just got lucky. Funny about MS back in '83 I said, watch this boys, you won't see this junk around very long and stuck with the 9000 computers like used at ORNL or Huntsville and most all large industry. I stayed in that world until MS95windows came out. And now after all this time I'd say MS is probably around 1990. Old versions available at the time (1983) did more than MS Office does now. The super computers not operating in DOS operated faster then even with less than 50 MHz prosessors.

I think Open Office (another platform to learn) opens docx.

Aubrey

Dan, was this a horizontal or vertical application? While I have not seen the abnormal wear patterns, I have found Falk grid coupling covers installed incorrectly on several vertical pumps. If the cover is not installed with the factory 'match mark' up, the grid may not be centered during operation. See the attachment from the Falk manual.

Falk.pdf (54 KB, 18 downloads) Falk Cover Installation