Apex Hydraulics recently worked together with a well-known snack manufacturer, to repair and improve their factory machinery, keeping them running for longer.
The Client
Factory managers had been struggling for years with the manufacturing machines for a well-known rice-based snack. Out of the 52 machines, often only one third were running at a time, because of constant cylinder failures. The company tried to repair the cylinders in-house but each time they only lasted a few days before failing again. This had a knock-on effect for production as at least 30 machines needed to be running at once to meet their quotas. It got to the stage where maintenance workers would find 4 or 5 machines each morning that had failed overnight.
After some time trying to keep the plant running in this way, the client contacted Apex Hydraulics to see if Apex could repair the cylinders, with a view to improving the design to make them more robust and give them a longer lifespan.
A Comprehensive Redesign
The first two cylinders arrived at Apex Hydraulics’ Dewsbury workshop last year. Apex engineers stripped them down and inspected them. There were several issues found with the current design and repair quality, so an upgraded modification was suggested to improve the lifespan of the cylinder. The cylinders were of tie-rod design and had a poorly designed gland area. Apex proposed to improve the sealing arrangements and the construction of the cylinder to give it a much longer life expectancy.
Having the correct seals can make a huge difference to the longevity of a hydraulic cylinder. Hydraulic cylinder designers always select the best seal, which will depend on multiple factors including the environment, material and the way that the machinery needs to work. In this instance designers selected new seals, new sealing arrangement and housing details.
Apex repaired the two cylinders and painted them a contrasting colour so that they are distinct and can be easily monitored against the cylinders that have not yet been re-designed. They are now back on the factory floor and currently undergoing trials, with initial feedback looking very positive.
Testing and Longevity
Time will tell the extent of the improvement over and above the original design. The new cylinders are currently being monitored for leaks to ensure that the Apex proposed design gives the clients the longevity that they want. Once proven, Apex will carry out repairs on the rest of the line, incorporating the new design. With two cylinders on each machine there are a total of 104 to upgrade. Once the repairs are approved, Apex will be able to take on bigger batches and do a rolling swap out of cylinders down the line, allowing all the machines to be refurbished with almost no factory downtime.
Related Products
The following products were utilised as part of this project. For more detailed information on these products, click on an image below…
