Update Your Bearing Protector Knowledge,

Part 1 of 2: Rotating Labyrinth Seals

Author: Heinz P. Bloch, P.E.

West Des Moines, Iowa 50266

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Much is known about the ill effects of moisture and particle contamination in process machinery lubricants. Dirt and water
ingress often occur because the sealing capability of conventional lip seals and straight labyrinth seals is limited at best.
Reliability-focused user companies therefore insist on better means of excluding both moisture and dust from equipment
bearing housings. Today, the top reliability-minded companies typically accomplish this exclusion with housing seals that
are sometimes called bearing protectors.

But bearing protector designs are constantly being improved, and our old notions about configurations and styles may
need to be reassessed from time to time. We decided it’s again time to confirm the importance of these seals and to give
our readers a brief technology update. Part 1 of this two-part update deals with overall contamination effects and rotating
labyrinth-type seals; the second part, scheduled for publication in next month’s issue of this journal, will deal with
industrial standards for bearing housing seals and modern magnetic bearing housing seals.

Where contaminants come from

Moisture typically enters bearing housings as airborne water vapor or a stream of water from hose-down operations.
Unless the equipment manufacturer or user provides suitable bearing housing seals, a contamination-inducing
interchange of housing-internal and housing-external (ambient) air takes place in the form of “breathing.” Bearing
housings are sure to breathe because we cannot change the laws of physics: Rising temperatures cause gas volume
expansion and dropping temperatures cause gas volume contraction. Open or inadequately sealed bearing housings
then allow pressure equalization and continuous back-and-forth movement of contaminated air.

On the other hand, fully sealed bearing housings undergo pressure changes instead of volume changes. Full sealing
implies the use of bearing protectors akin to face seals; it also implies the elimination of housing vents. Of course, the
lubricant application method must accommodate the fact that temperature changes cause pressures to deviate from
ambient in bearing housings sealed with modern face seals and plugged vent ports. Such application methods include
balanced constant level lubricators that will not allow the lubricant to be contacted by outside or ambient air. Modern
application methods also include flinger discs and, while not the subject of this discussion, these flinger discs are vastly
superior to oil rings. It should be noted that modern flinger discs are readily available and will enhance the lubrication
effectiveness of both vented as well as non-vented bearing housings in equal measure (Ref. 1-1).

Contamination effects on bearing life

It is also well known that in many environments airborne dust is being ingested in sufficient quantities to exceed bearing
manufacturers’ guideline values by factors of 100 and more (Ref. 1-2). That being the case, operation without sealing or
with inadequate sealing of bearing housings will prove very costly and is virtually never found in reliability-focused user
companies.

In Ref. 1-3, European bearing manufacturer FAG emphasizes that the severity of the undesirable end effects of
contamination depends on the ratio of operating viscosity of a lubricant divided by its rated viscosity (Fig. 1-1). While
there obviously could be an almost infinite number of combinations in the amount of contamination and ratios of
viscosity, ratios of 0.5 to perhaps 1.0 are thought rather typical. Using 0.5 for this ratio, and plotting from the mid-point
of the zone labeled “contaminants in lubricant” (Zone lll) to the mid-point of the zone labeled “high degree of cleanliness
in the lubricating gap,” (Zone ll) we would find a four-fold increase in bearing life for the cleaner oil. At a viscosity ratio of
2:1, the projected bearing life increase traversing from “contaminated” to “clean” would be approximately seven-fold. It
should be noted that we are not here considering “ultra-clean” (Zone l) oil, since it would be unrealistic to find this degree
of cleanliness in field-installed process pump bearing housings.

Having understood the life-limiting effects of lube oil contamination, reliability-focused equipment users found it easy to
cost-justify and/or retrofit superior means of bearing protection (Ref. 1-4). In lieu of inexpensive lip seals, either magnetic
face seals or thoughtfully engineered, well-tested rotating labyrinth seals are now applied by bottom-line cost conscious
users. These modern bearing housing seals are found in thousands of process machines; these include centrifugal
pumps, fans and gear units where a variety of other, demonstrably inferior sealing strategies were previously utilized.
But the most authoritative data on the effects of lubricant contamination might perhaps be gleaned from the General
Catalog of another leading bearing manufacturer, SKF (Ref. 1-5). For the example shown in their catalog, SKF applied its
New Life Theory to an oil-lubricated 45 mm radial bearing running at constant load and speed. Under ultra-clean

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 conditions (nc = 1), this example bearing was calculated to reach 15,250
operating hours. The SKF catalog text goes on to explain that, if the example
were to be calculated for contaminated conditions such that nc =0.02, bearing
life would be only 287 operating hours. We believe this is powerful analytical
evidence in support of industry moves towards better bearing housing
protection.

Fig. 1-1: Contamination adjustment factor “a23”

vs. viscosity ratio (Source: FAG Bearings,
Schweinfurt, Germany, also Ref. 1)

Rotating Labyrinth Seals: How they work and how they differ
It can be shown that in process machinery such as the literally millions of centrifugal pumps operating today, modern
housing seals make much economic sense (Ref. 1-6). Findings of rapid payback and quantifiable failure reductions are
supported both by industry statistics and the failure rate plots issued by several lip seal manufacturers. For decades, lip
seals have been out of compliance with the minimum requirements stated in the widely accepted API-610 industry
standard for centrifugal pumps (Ref. 1-7). Indeed, most rotating labyrinth seals are a good choice for fluid machine
bearing protection and will generally outperform lip seals by wide margins.

It must be realized, however, that there are many types, configurations or versions of rotating labyrinth seals. Different
configurations will allow anything from a truly minimal amount of “breathing” and virtually zero leakage, to a rather
significant amount of breathing and worrisome leakage. The amounts of breathing and leakage depend very much on the
design and construction features of a given make or brand and must be compared against the configuration and/or
construction features of another make or brand.

There are other considerations or marketing parameters that should be noted by reliability and value-focused observers.
Before deciding to buy, a value-focused observer will require potential vendors to provide test data and cross-sectional
views that disclose the operating principles of different versions of bearing protector seals. Remember, you’re not asking
for the disclosure of proprietary manufacturing drawings; however, you should feel entitled to see exactly what you are
purchasing. Some vendors either refuse or are unable to provide data other than marketing claims and anecdotal
references. Since these vendors will not enable you to make an informed choice, they deserve neither your time nor
consideration.

That, fortunately, still leaves us a few vendors and manufacturers whose cooperative attitude facilitates rigorous
comparisons. A detailed, albeit brief, review of their relevant drawings or patent applications will often prove revealing.
For instance, it is evident that some rotating labyrinth designs and configurations are decidedly not field-repairable
whereas other manufacturers have made it their business to design this “in-place repairability” into rotating labyrinth
seals. Also, certain hybrid designs incorporate sliding lip seals between rotating and stationary components while others
are fitted with an O-ring that moves radially in and out of a groove. Observe the difficulty of maintaining close
manufacturing tolerances in bearing protectors whose effectiveness depends on sliding motion of a dynamic (or moving)
O-ring against the edges of an abrupt groove. In contrast, visualize another, more modern-design that incorporates a
dynamic O-ring making contact with a relatively large area.

Available area of contact is important in O-ring devices; elementary engineering, of course, confirms that pressure equals
force divided by area of contact. The pressure will be much lower when the same force acts on a large area, than if that
same force were to contact a sharp edge--essentially an extremely small area. A tiny amount of lubricant must be present
to counteract wear, but that tiny amount is far more likely to stick to a large surface at low pressure than to a much smaller
surface at high pressure.

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Dynamic O-rings must lift off for low wear rates
It certainly was (and remains) the original design purpose for O-rings to seal against an applied fluid pressure. In most
conventional O-ring applications, fluid pressure forces the O-ring against contacting groove surfaces and the elastomer
forms a stationary seal. In hydraulic cylinders, the O-ring is often inserted in a closely dimensioned groove in the piston.
When the piston is stroked, the O-ring is said to become a dynamic O-ring. Because the hydraulic fluid provides sufficient
lubrication between O-ring periphery and cylinder bore, reasonably long life is generally attained.

However, in a number of rotating labyrinth seals the O-ring is expected to lift off radially when the shaft is rotating.
Conversely, the O-ring is expected to seal the small gap between rotating and stationary component whenever the shaft
stops turning. Will it lift off as anticipated?

At the end of this article, the interested reader will find a calculation one of our colleagues made (in 2001) on the
centrifugal force effects acting on dynamic (rotating) O-rings. As expected, the results of these calculations show force
effects to vary as a function of O-ring dimensions and material properties. Nevertheless, by way of summary and for
general guidance here relating to 3-inch (~75 mm) O-rings with an initial stretch of 0.003 inches (0.075 mm), the
approximate lift-off speed would be 350 rpm. It should be noted that this would suggest trouble for equipment being
slow-rolled during, say, the warm-up period for turbine-driven pumps. Indeed, Ref. 1-8 contains illustrations that show
O-ring degradation for rotating labyrinth seals of the decades-old “ring-in-groove” configuration at slow speeds.

Test setups and leakage test results

Using the setup shown in Figure 1-2, at least one vendor-manufacturer has performed a wide range of leakage tests on
a variety of bearing protectors including, of course, the vendor’s own designs.

Yet, very few manufacturers seem to have made well-defined efforts to verify the wear life or leakage behavior of their
own, let alone a competitor’s, bearing protector seals. While some advertise their products as non-contacting, simple
logic tells us that such seals will always allow an interchange between ambient and housing-internal air. Fortunately, the
contamination-inducing interchange of air can be minimized by thoughtful engineering and by incorporating a multi-stage
design. A field-repairable multi-stage design, Figure 1-3, has proved to exclude contaminants to a far better extent than
other bearing protector products, with the obvious exception of face-type (or face-contacting) magnetic seals, to be
discussed in Part 2 of this sequence of articles.

Figure 1-2: Schematic Representation of Modern Test Setup for Bearing Protectors
(Source: AESSeal, Inc., Rotherham, UK, and Knoxville, Tennessee)

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Rotating labyrinth seals with integral, self-adjusting axially energized shut-off O-rings

Fig. 1-3: Rotating labyrinth seal with integral, self-adjusting axially energized
shut-off O-rings in operating (left) and stand-still (right) condition. (Source:
AESSeal Inc., Rotherham, UK and Knoxville, Tennessee)

The field-repairable and rather innovative compound cartridge rotating labyrinth seal design of Figure 3 is also shown in
Figures 4 and 5. It offers some rather unique features. Moreover, the manufacturer submitted detailed and highly
impressive test data that seem to indicate attractive life expectancies and virtual freedom from leakage. Here’s how it
works:

In the equipment idle condition (right portion of Fig. 1-3), the elastomer applies a radial load on the upper quadrant of
the primary shut-off valve. When the equipment is operating (left portion of Fig. 1-3), the energizing member is subjected
to centrifugal forces that cause it to move radially outwards and disengage it from the primary shut-off valve. This allows
the primary shut-off valve to move away from the stationary ring. The resulting micro-gap allows the bearing housing to
breathe. As the equipment stops, the energizing member again takes up its idle position and axially moves the primary
shut-off valve to make a static seal with the stator (or stationary ring) of Figure 1-3.

The shut-off valve member is manufactured from a wear-resistant material

with a low coefficient of friction. It is reported that this simple, yet effective
arrangement prevents moisture droplets from being sucked back into the
oil during cycles of bearing chamber breathing.

The second moisture ingress feature of the seal shown in Figures 1-3 and
1-4 is a multi-tiered terrace system compromised of a complex tortuous
path between the counter-rotating members together with a series of
orifice outlets. The system creates a cascading effect (Figure 1-4) and
extensive testing confirmed that water intrusion is virtually non-existent.

In essence, then, these developments show that technology advances

are made even as we read and try to stay informed. That said, reliability-
focused users welcome suitable updates and actively consider improved
products. This theme will continue next month in Part 2, dealing with
magnetic bearing housing seals.
Fig. 1-4: Multi-tiered arrangement, tortuous path and
expulsion orifices of modern, field-repairable rotating
labyrinth seal (Source: AESSeal, Inc.,Rotherham, UK,
and Knoxville, Tennessee)

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References:

1-1: TRICO Mfg. Company, Pewaukee, Wisconsin, (www.tricomfg.com)

1-2: Adams, Erickson, Needelman and Smith, (1996) Proceedings of the 13th
International Pump User’s Symposium, Texas A&M University, Houston,
TX, pp. 71-79

1-3: Eschmann, Hasbargen and Weigand; (1985), ISBN 0-471-26283-8),

“Ball and Roller Bearings,” John Wiley & Sons, New York, NY, pg. 183

1-4: Bloch, Heinz P. and Alan Budris; (2004) “Pump User’s Handbook: Life
Extension”, The Fairmont Press, Inc., Lilburn, GA 30047,
ISBN 0-88173-452-7

1-5: SKF Catalog 140-170, August 1988, Page 40, Figure 17

1-6: API-610, Standard for Refinery-Type Centrifugal Pumps, 8th and later
Editions, The American Petroleum Institute, Washington, DC.

1-7: Bloch, Heinz P.; “Twelve Equipment Reliability Enhancements With 10:1
Payback,”, NPRA Paper RMC-05-82, Presented at NPRA Reliability and
Maintenance Conference, New Orleans, May 2005

1-8: Roddis, Alan; “21st Century Bearing Protectors,” presented at 2nd

International Symposium on Centrifugal Pumps, The State-of-Art and
New Developments, London, U.K., September 22, 2004

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Registered Office: Global Technology Centre, Mill Close, Rotherham, S60 1BZ; Tel. No: +44 1709 369966