Parts / Accessories
The AEGIS® Conductive MicroFiber™ Shaft Grounding Ring from Electro Static Technology improves the reliability of HVAC/R systems by dramatically extending motor life. By protecting bearings from electrical damage for the life of the motor, the AEGIS® SGR prevents bearing noise and costly motor repairs and downtime. It is ideal for OEM motor and fan manufacturers, repair shops, HVAC service contractors, and in-house maintenance departments and can be easily installed as part of a preventive maintenance program. Detailed technical information is available at www.est-aegis.com.
When AC motors, commonly used in HVAC/R systems to drive fans, air pumps, chillwater pumps, compressors, and other air-handling equipment, are employed with variable frequency drives (VFDs), currents are induced on the motor shafts. Without a grounding device, these currents typically discharge through the motor bearings, causing frosting, pitting, fusion craters, and fluting. This damage can lead first to noise that travels throughout a building's ductwork, then to motor failure, and finally to failure of the entire HVAC/R system. By safely channeling harmful shaft current away from the motor bearings to ground, the SGR prevents electrical bearing damage, and the noise and motor failures it causes.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors : Airports
8/24/2018 | Group Article
One of the most promising opportunities for reducing energy consumption in HVAC systems involves the use of variable frequency drives (VFDs) to control the speed of motors. In fact, in such applications VFDs have been shown to reduce energy consumption by 20 to 30%. The use of VFDs on baggage handling and delivery systems not only saves energy, but by precisely controlling the motor’s speed, it ensures smooth conveyor operation and improves the baggage handling process. Regardless of the application, VFDs can damage the motors they control. They induce currents on motor shafts that discharge through the bearings, causing pitting, fluting, and catastrophic motor failure. Without bearing protection, any savings from the use of VFDs can be quickly wiped out by the cost of replacing motors and by system downtime.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors : HVAC Systems
8/24/2018 | Group Article
The growing “green” movement has led to a flood of new standards including the US Greens Building Councils Building Performance Initiative, the Green Building Initiative, and LEED — all aimed at increasing energy efficiency and sustainability. Challenged to reduce energy consumption and to document savings, America’s facilities managers are installing variable frequency drives (VFDs) in HVAC systems as one of the best ways of achieving such savings. VFDs can damage the motors they control. They induce currents on motor shafts that discharge through the bearings, causing pitting, fluting, and catastrophic motor failure. Without bearing protection, any savings from the use of VFDs can be quickly wiped out by the cost of replacing motors and by system downtime. To make HVAC systems sustainable as well as energy efficient, a reliable method of bearing protection is required.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors : Meat and Poultry
8/24/2018 | Group Article
Meat and poultry processors face staggering losses due to spoilage if their equipment goes down. And despite their benefits, VFDs can cause downtime by damaging the motors they control. In an effort to eliminate such unplanned downtime, many processors are looking for ways to prevent motor failures by protecting bearings from VFD-induced electrical damage.
Making Motors Sustainable At Time & Life Building
8/24/2018 | Group Article
VFDs hold the promise of sizable energy savings, but without adequate shaft grounding they are not a sustainable green solution. Operations and maintenance costs are often 60% to 80% of the total life-cycle costs of a building. With equipment that does not have to be repaired or replaced as often, that percentage will drop. Energy-saving technology must be sustainable to help reduce these costs. By significantly reducing the number of costly repairs resulting from the use of energy-efficient VFDs, the SGR provides sustainability, making the motor-VFD system a truly green solution.
To Be Considered “True Inverter-Duty”, Motors Need Bearing Protection
8/24/2018 | Group Article
For motors without adequate bearing protection, the term “inverter-duty” is misleading. It ignores a major potential cause of premature bearing and motor failure — electrical discharge machining. Virtually all VFD-driven motors are vulnerable to bearing damage, but for too long the importance of shaft grounding to protect motor bearings has been ignored or underestimated. To ensure the reliability of “inverter-duty” motors, an effective long-term method of shaft grounding is essential. And while some leading motor manufacturers are now installing the AEGIS® Bearing Protection Ring in selected models, most motors labeled “inverter-duty” or “inverterready” are still not adequately protected. It is thus incumbent on savvy specifiers to make sure that any motor to be used with a VFD is truly inverter-ready — equipped at the factory or retrofitted with a proven shaft grounding ring.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors : Food Processing
8/24/2018 | Group Article
One of the most promising opportunities for improving reliability, avoiding unplanned downtime costs, and reducing energy consumption involves the use of variable frequency drives (VFDs) to control the speed of motors. In fact, in such applications VFDs have been shown to reduce energy consumption by 20 to 30%. The use of VFDs on food processing systems and equipment such as conveyors, pumps, mixers, compressors, and other equipment not only saves energy, but by precisely controlling motor speed, it enables the fine tuning and precise control of food preparation, transfer, and packaging processes.
Specifying Bearing Protection for Sustainability
8/24/2018 | Group Article
By allowing motors to run at less than full speed, variable frequency drives can reduce the energy required to run them by 30% or more. But VFDs can also damage bearings, shorten motor life, and diminish the reliability of motor-driven systems. To ensure that these systems and the savings they yield are sustainable, designers and engineers must specify proven, long-term electrical bearing protection — AEGIS® Shaft Grounding Rings.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors : Distribution Centres
8/24/2018 | Group Article
Running conveyors and brake motors at full speed uses a tremendous amount of power — power that is all-too-often wasted. To reduce or eliminate this waste of power, facilities engineers are installing variable frequency drives (VFDs) throughout these distribution centers to precisely control the speed of motors and dramatically reduce energy costs. But, VFDs can damage the motors they control. They induce currents on motor shafts that discharge through the bearings, causing pitting, fluting, and catastrophic motor failure. Without bearing protection, any savings from the use of VFDs can be quickly wiped out by the cost of replacing motors and by system downtime. To make conveyor systems sustainable as well as energy efficient, a reliable method of bearing protection is required.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors : Commercial Ships
8/24/2018 | Group Article
When a bulk carrier experienced electrical erosion in the main auxiliary reduction gears that drive the ship’s 1.5 MW generator, power to the ship’s many electrical motors was lost. To assess the situation and recommend a fix, the shipping line called in Xview, the master distributor for AEGIS® Bearing Protection Rings in China. After taking readings from the shaft of the generator, Xview technicians determined that high-frequency voltage spikes (4-6 volts) were being passed from the generator to the gearbox and were causing arcing in the gearbox and bearings.Xview recommended an AEGIS® PRO Ring, a bearing protection ring with multiple rows of conductive microfibers to bleed these voltages from the shaft safely to ground. Although the cost to repair the gearbox was over $1 million, installing the AEGIS® PRO ring saved the shipping line hundreds of thousands of dollars in repair costs and lost revenues.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors : Healthcare Facilities
8/24/2018 | Group Article
When dealing with today’s advanced medical procedures, the loss of vital equipment could mean the loss of a patient’s life. So, for operating rooms, labs, and quarantine areas, the reliability of ventilation equipment is critically important in safeguarding sterility and preventing infection. In an effort to ensure the quality of vital operating room and intensive care environments and 100% uptime of critical equipment, hospitals and healthcare facilities are looking for ways to prevent motor failures by protecting their bearings from VFD-induced electrical damage.
Local Motor Shop Helps Kansas Water Authority Solve Bearing-Damage Problem
8/22/2018 | Case Study
Electrical engineer Dan Biby of Professional Engineering Consultants (PEC), Wichita, KS, helped design the new Reverse Osmosis Water Treatment Center for the city of Hutchinson, Kansas. After the completion of the plant, he found some motors making the telltale whine of fluted bearings. The repairs had been inadequate. Then he tried Independent Electric Machinery Company (IEMCO), a Kansas City motor repair shop. Damaged motors had been successfully reconditioned. IEMCO installed an AEGIS® ring at the nondrive end and ceramic-coated bearings at the drive end on horizontal pump motors. By the end of 2011, all 17 of the plant’s pump motors were protected from electrical bearing damage. Today, they are all still running without any problems.
Grounding of HVAC Motor Shafts Protects Bearings, Lowers Repair Costs
8/22/2018 | Research & Development
Maximum energy efficiency is the cornerstone of a long and growing list of building certification initiatives such as LEED, Green Globes, Zero Energy Buildings, Living Building Challenge, and Energy Star for Buildings. And variable frequency drives (or VFDs) are a key tool in achieving this energy efficiency. By allowing motors to run at less than full speed, VFDs let HVAC system designers match capacity to changing heating / cooling loads, dramatically reducing energy costs. But VFDs can also damage the bearings of the motors they control — often in as little as 3 months! To ensure the reliability of VFD-driven HVAC motors and lock in energy savings from VFDs, proven long-term bearing protection is essential.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors In : Motor Repair Best Practices
8/22/2018 | Datasheet
Motors operated by variable frequency drives (VFD) are vulnerable to premature bearing failure from VFD induced shaft voltages and bearing currents – sometimes within only weeks or months – and the result is costly down time and production interruptions. Avoiding these costs makes economic sense and pays a high return on investment. VFDs induce destructive shaft voltages and high frequency currents which will cause electrical discharge machining (EDM) pitting, fusion craters, and fluting damage to the motor’s bearings and deteriorate the bearing lubrication by allowing electrical arcing to burn the grease. Motor repair best practices will provide bearing protection from these destructive bearing currents by adding AEGIS® Shaft Grounding Ring Technology and when needed insulating a bearing to prevent high frequency circulating currents.
University Improves Sustainability of HVAC Motors in Platinum LEED® Building
8/22/2018 | Case Study
Operations and maintenance costs are often 60-80% of the total life-cycle costs of a building. With equipment that does not have to be repaired or replaced as often, that percentage will drop. Energy-saving technology must be sustainable to help reduce these costs. In the case of VFDs, to “bank” cost savings from their reduced energy usage, users must protect the bearings of motors controlled by the VFDs with proven long-term, maintenance-free shaft grounding such as that provided by the AEGIS® SGR Bearing Protection Ring. At a leading New England Ivy League University's maintenance department estimates that several hundred motors campus-wide could benefit from this technology, and they are hoping the test results will entice individual building managers to contact the department for an evaluation.
Grounding Ring Solves Chronic Bearing Damage In Crane Motors at Container Ports
8/22/2018 | Case Study
At the Pacific Container Terminal in Long Beach, California, huge cranes lift boxcar-sized containers, arranging them neatly on trains, trucks, and the decks of ships. If the cranes are not working, the whole process shudders to a halt. SSA Marine, owner of the cranes, is just emerging from an ordeal. For years, every one of the company’s 10 cranes, each capable of lifting 50 tons, was plagued with chronic bearing damage. But Reed Electric & Field Service, a Los Angeles motor repair plant, has finally found the cure — the AEGIS® PRO Series Bearing Protection Ring manufactured by Electro Static Technology.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors In : Oil Drilling and Pipelines
8/22/2018 | Group Article
Oil drilling and pipelines often involve challenging environments. Dust, dirt, water, grease, and oil can interfere with the shaft contact of grounding devices and severely hamper their effectiveness.To protect them from excessive dirt, oil, and other contaminants in oil drilling/transport applications, AEGIS® Rings should be installed inside the motor. While motor repair shops can easily handle this type of installation, a growing number of motor manufacturers offer off-the-shelf motors with AEGIS® Rings factory installed internally.
Purdue Nanotechnology Labs Employ Advanced Grounding Device to Ensure a Constant Flow of Clean Air
8/22/2018 | Case Study
A single speck of dust could spoil a whole experiment at Purdue University’s new Birck Nanotechnology Center. To minimize the likelihood of such a scenario, the building’s HVAC system has to be fast, forceful, and flawless. Such high performance is attained by carefully selected air-handling equipment that includes a new grounding device to extend motor life.
Motor Shaft Grounding Rings Reduce Downtime and Repairs At Midwest Paper Mill
8/22/2018 | Case Study
At a paper mill in the Midwest, every new motor controlled by a variable frequency drive (VFD) is tested, and if shaft voltages are found, the motor must be equipped with an AEGIS® Bearing Protection Ring to divert damaging currents to ground. The plant’s electrical reliability engineer established this money-saving specification after many years of frustration from recurring bearing failures.
Cement Maker Protects Bearings With AEGIS® PRO Series Grounding Rings
8/22/2018 | Case Study
Since 2001, when the Monarch Cement Company’s huge ball mill was new, its motor bearings had been replaced three times. In 2009, Randy Riebel, electrical supervisor at Monarch’s plant in Humboldt, chose the PRO split-ring model, which is designed to facilitate field retrofits, instead of replacing bearings. By safely channeling harmful electrical currents away from bearings to ground, the PRO Ring extends the lives of medium-voltage motors and generators, thus improving the reliability of entire systems in which they are used.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors In : Dairy Production
8/22/2018 | Group Article
Every step in the production of dairy products — from collecting raw milk to transporting, processing, packaging, and storing milk and milk products — requires precise control of process variables such as temperature, flow rates, pressure, line speed, etc. By precisely controlling the speed and torque of motors, VFDs provide cost-effective control of these key process variables.But, VFDs can damage motors. They induce voltages on the shafts on motors they control — voltages that discharge through the bearings, causing pitting, fluting, and catastrophic motor failure. Without bearing protection, any benefits from the use of VFDs can be quickly wiped out by the high costs of motor repair, downtime, and lost production
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors In : Steelmaking
8/22/2018 | Group Article
According to the American Iron and Steel Institute, energy costs account for 20% of the cost of producing steel. So, by reducing energy consumption, steel plants can increase profitability. By allowing precise control of motor speed, variable frequency drives (VFDs) not only reduce energy costs by 30% or more, they improve process control, reduce waste/spoilage, and help improve product quality. But, VFDs can damage motors. They induce voltages on the shafts of the motor they control — voltages that can discharge through motor bearings, causing fluting and catastrophic motor failure. By diverting damaging bearing currents safely to ground, AEGIS® Shaft Grounding Rings ensure the reliable, long-term operation of VFD-driven steel mill motors and systems.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors In : Ski Resorts
8/22/2018 | Group Article
To improve control and reduce the energy costs of lift operations, many resorts are installing variable frequency drives (VFDs). In regions where natural snowfall is inconsistent or inadequate to ensure good ski conditions, resorts must rely on snow-making. For most ski resorts, lift and snow-making operations account for more than 80% of total energy costs. VFDs can dramatically reduce energy costs, but they can also damage the motors they control. They induce voltages on motor shafts that discharge through the bearings, causing pitting, fluting, and catastrophic motor failure. Without bearing protection, energy savings from the use of VFDs can be quickly wiped out by the exceptionally high cost of repairs, downtime, and lost production.
Protecting VFD - Driven Motors : Bearing Protection Best Practices
8/22/2018 | Datasheet
Motors operated by variable frequency drives (VFD) are vulnerable to VFD-induced shaft voltages and bearing currents that can cause premature bearing failure - often in as little as 3 months! VFDs induce destructive shaft voltages and high frequency currents which can discharge through motor bearings, burning bearing grease and reducing its effectiveness. Through electrical discharge machining (EDM), these discharges can also cause pitting, frosting, and fluting damage to the motor’s bearings and eventual bearing failure. The result is costly repairs, downtime, and lost production. By channeling harmful VFD-induced shaft voltages away from bearings and safely to ground, AEGIS® Shaft Grounding Rings protect motors from costly bearing damage.