The Lightweight Bearing: When Conventional Rolling Bearings Reach Their Limits

Franke delivers the 40,000th CT warehouse. The wire rolling bearings have something in common: their lightweight construction, high dynamics and their flexible application possibilities.

Light Bearings for HighTech: Franke Wire Race Bearings.

The Franke Wire Race Bearings allow an individual design of the enclosing construction as well as a free choice of materials. This makes it possible to manufacture the housing parts of the bearing extremely thin-walled and matched to the adjacent construction.

The functionality of all Franke products is based on the "Franke principle": Rolling elements roll on special running wires, which are inserted into enclosing constructions. Due to the four-point arrangement of these run wires loads can be absorbed from all directions.

With the LEG 8, Franke has developed a new bearing element that could establish itself as an interesting alternative in the market of thin-section bearings.

The Franke Wire Race Bearings allow an individual design of the enclosing construction as well as a free choice of materials. This makes it possible to manufacture the housing parts of the bearing extremely thin-walled and matched to the adjacent construction. Alternative materials such as aluminum or even plastic are suitable for manufacturing the enclosing construction and save weight or drive energy. Applications in which wire-rolling bearing technology can score and conventional rolling bearings reach their limits can be found in many areas. Here are two examples.

Wire rolling bearings in computer tomographs

Speeds up to 300 rpm, noise development <60 dB (A) and rotational resistance of <15Nm with a bearing diameter of 1000mm are key data that can only be achieved with highly specialized rolling bearings. Wire reels from Aalen are convincing with their constructional flexibility, which makes it possible to use double-row angular contact ball bearings adapted to the customer's construction, which are additionally dampened by elastomers. This is not possible with conventional bearings.

Wire rolling bearings in vehicle technology

Lightweight design, minimal installation space, temperature insensitivity, internal elasticity to compensate for vehicle twisting, low rotational resistance - properties that are important in the field of vehicle construction / aeronautical engineering. Slewing rings made of aluminum by warehouse specialist Franke are the first choice for these requirements. Areas of application include rotating satellite antennas on vehicle roofs, direct-drive wheel bearings, high-precision laser measuring devices on aircraft fuselages, mobile outdoor cameras on helicopters and much more.