Lessons

Learned:

Oil Refinery
Catastrophic
Pump & Motor
Damage Due to
Thrust Bearing
Failure-1998

By Yousif Shuhail
Pump Consultant

Non-Business Use
Cutter Stock Batch pump
and Motor. The report
concludes that the root
cause of the failure was
lack of lubrication:

The sequence of events of

the failure was as follows:
Lack of lubrication
initiated the pump thrust
bearing failure, which in
turn caused the shaft to
overheat. As a result, the
pump shaft got softened
and eventually broke.
This created a large mass
unbalance at the inboard
side of the motor due to
the bent shaft end and the
heavy gear coupling which
eventually broke one side
of the motor support.
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Close field inspection of the
pump and motor showed
that the following damage
had occurred:
1- PUMP:
• Thrust bearing was found
damaged.
• Bearing bracket ribs were
broken.
• Bearing bracket end plate
showed indication of
overheating.
• Shaft had broken at the
inboard bearing.
• The nipple for the oil mist
balanced tube assembly and
the sight glass was broken.
2- MOTOR:
• Motor lay on one side.
• One side of motor feet was
broken.
3- COUPLING:
• Coupling guard was
damaged.
• Motor coupling hub was
found damaged.
• Coupling remained
attached to the motor shaft.
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The major pump damage
included a broken shaft, a
damaged thrust bearing and
a broken bearing housing.
As a result of the bearing
damage and the vibration
generated caused the nipple
for the oil mist balanced
tube assembly to break and
the oil to spill on the base
plate.
The oil level sight glass was
found to be dirty. Visual
inspection of the oil revealed
that it was not discolored.
The major motor damage
included one side of the
motor support and motor
coupling hub was broken.
The thrust bearing was
found damaged and showed
discoloration which
indicated overheating. The
broken pump shaft was
found plastically deformed
and discolored at the thrust
bearing location.
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Conclusion On Root
Causes:
1- The pump and motor
failure was initiated by the
pump thrust bearing
failure.
2- The pump thrust
bearing failure was caused
by lack of lubrication (low
lube oil level) possibly due
to a leak in the lube oil
piping leading to the level
sight glass or from the
housing drain plug.
3- The misconception of
the function of the oil mist
system and the unclarity of
the oil level sight glasses
contributed to
undermining of the
importance of the proper
oil level and indirectly
permitting low lube oil
level.
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Thank You ☺
This failure analysis
provides a clear warning to
facilities whose pumps
operate with flammable or
hazardous liquids.
It is important to provide
some type of low cost but
reliable automatic
shutdown protection to
prevent such catastrophic
incidents.
The simplest protection is
to install online vibration
seismic sensors reading
velocity on bearing
housing, a total of two are
sufficient in horizontal
direction. To save costs,
motor will not require
protection as the pump is
main instigator of such
hazardous incidents.
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