What to Expect from a SEW Gearbox Repair and Maintenance Service?

Mobility is a must in today’s competitive scenario, whether it is automobiles, or industrial machines. Fortunately, there are tools and services available to keep your machines running, up, and functional. Gears are a device which enhance, reduce, and control the speed and torque of a machine, and hence play an important role in its motion. These gears are enclosed in a gearbox with a few other components such as bearings and shafts. So, what is a gearbox? It is basically an assembly of gears, a transmission system, which with the help of gears and actuators transmits mechanical energy from the automobile engine, machine, or the concerned output device. SEW EURODRIVE is a renowned manufacturer of various automobile and machine mobility-related products including gear drives, gear units, industrial gears, frequency invertors, and gear motors. These products are designed for harsh working conditions. There are times, when they may not work as expected, and require a repair. This is when you may approach a SEW gearbox repair service. What to expect from them? Read the post to find answers.

Types of Gearbox Components

Before moving to gearbox repairs, it is essential to know the components of gearbox and which ones undergo maximum wear and tear. Here are the details of some gearbox components:

• Gears: They generate torque based on their size. They help in transferring power from one shaft to the other.
• Main shaft: The main shaft provides torque to the engine or automobile. It is also called output shaft which enables the movement of gears.
• Clutch shaft: the clutch shaft is connected to the driving shaft, which rotates along with the former. It supplies power to other shafts.
• Counter shaft: This shaft comprises gears of various sizes that enables it to produce torque of different capacities. This shaft also rotates along with clutch shaft but at a different speed.
• Bearings: Bearings reduce friction and offer support to the shaft. They are mounted on each end of all the shafts in the gearbox.

SEW Gearbox Repair and Maintenance

Most service providers, apart from repairs, do offer maintenance, upgrade, and rebuilding services for gearboxes, and there are obvious benefits of availing such services. Some of them include reduced repairs, increased efficiency of machines, reduced downtime, and more. There are various types of repair services are offered depending upon the type of gearbox and the issue. The standard turnaround times for repairing gearboxes varies between 1 and 10 days, depending upon the complexity of the issue. It may take up to even five weeks if gearbox replacement or a complete overhaul is required. How does a typical SEW gearbox repair service look like? The following steps will help you understand it better.

• Inspection: This includes routine inspection and maintenance, and inspection of gearboxes to identify the reason for failure or root cause. There are various tools and techniques used for inspection apart from visual inspection, such as vibration monitoring and videoscopic monitoring among others.
• Re-chroming services: This process basically means hard chrome plating on automotive components including gears, shafts, rollers, and dies to improve their performance by reducing friction and increasing resistance to abrasion.
• Gear hobbing and grinding: This machined process comprises gear cutting, wherein a series of cuts are given to the gear teeth.
• Welding and fabrication: This is an integral part of repairs, rebuilding, and remanufacturing gearboxes as metals used for the same need to be cut and bent in a required manner and welded to form strong joints. Fabrication is done using CNC milling and turning machines.
• Shaft and roller repair: Constant use of these two parts causes wear & tear over time. However, they can be built up to their original sizes, capacities and tolerance levels. This saves cost rather than replacing the parts.

If you use a SEW gearbox and require maintenance and repair for the same, ensure you contact a reliable service provider. Additionally, make sure the repair center is UL and EASA approved. Motor & Gear Engineering, Inc. is one of the well-known sales and service providers of SEW gearboxes and related repairs. They provide various SEW gear unit products including RM Series, DAS motors, and variable speed gear motors.