The Belgian brewery Chimay, known for its traditional Trappist beer, relies on maintenance-free spherical bearings from igus in its bottling plant. By replacing rusty, seized ball bearings with lubrication-free igubal H3 bearing inserts, the brewery was able to increase efficiency and reduce maintenance.
The Chimay Brewery is one of twelve breweries in the world that produces Trappist beer, made by monks. Interestingly, the majority of their profits are intended for social projects. Brewed at Notre-Dame de Scourmont Abbey in the Belgian province of Hainaut, Chimay produced around 18.5 megalitres of beer in 2018. The high production requirements posed special challenges for the bottling plants, especially due to frequent failures and the seizing of conventional metallic ball bearings to shafts. The replacement of a defective ball bearing could take up to one and a half days, which unfortunately led to production losses. As part of a project to optimise the filling lines, Chimay turned to igus to find a permanent solution to this problem. After a series of tests and optimisations, the igubal H3 bearing proved to be the optimal choice and since the changeover in September 2022, these bearings have shown very little wear.
Lubrication-free, safe, and easy to clean
The igubal H3 bearings offer many advantages that improve the brewery’s production process. They are made of tribologically optimised high-performance plastics. This makes them lubrication-free, maintenance-free and corrosion resistant. The bearing material is working well within design limits even at speeds of 200 rpm. The igubal bearing inserts are also easier to install and replace than metal ball bearings, thus reducing maintenance times. In addition, the bearings do not experience wear-related shaft damage, which extends the service life of the entire system.
Another advantage is the high resistance of the igubal H3 bearing inserts to chemicals. Despite regular cleaning processes, they show no signs of damage. Due to these characteristics, the line achieves a speed of 55,000 bottles per hour. After a test phase on three different production conveyors, Chimay has ordered 150 additional bearing inserts to replace the remaining ball bearings.
“With the igubal H3 bearings, we have been able to solve the most important problem on our conveyor systems and significantly extend the service life of our systems,” said Vivien De Schryver, maintenance technician at Chimay.
