GRAPHALLOY Solves Bearing Seizures in Steel Mill

Bearing problems? One steel mill had them — and lots of them. Greased roller bearings in their guide rolls were seizing under high heat (170–180°C), causing maintenance headaches and production delays.

Their team turned to GRAPHALLOY® bushings, a graphite/metal alloy that doesn’t require grease and thrives in high temps. After six months with GRAPHALLOY in place, the plant manager gave a glowing review: “They’re performing very well.”

Now they’re upgrading all the guide rolls.

Learn more about GRAPHALLOY’s performance in high-temp applications:n:

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GRAPHALLOY Solves Problems in High Temperature Steel Mill Cooling Bed

A Midwestern steel mill was using GRAPHALLOY® bushings for the horizontal rollers in their cooling beds. The bushings were thriving under severe heat and water spray conditions. 

Because of this success, the mill was considering using GRAPHALLOY flange bearings for another application: the vertical guide rollers along the sides of the cooling beds that were used to keep the hot steel from running off the sides. 

These guide rollers remain static until a piece of hot steel slams up against them. At this moment, they are expected to turn instantly to guide the steel back onto the cooling bed. This mill had been using conventional greased rolling element bearings in the vertical guides that were lasting only a few months. GRAPHALLOY proved to be successful on the vertical rollers as well and the mill has since retro-fitted additional lines with GRAPHALLOY.