60 brushes per minute

Known world-wide as a special purpose machinery builder

Independent of size, bristle type and brush type, many manufacturers of technical brushes throughout the world use machines made by Wöhler Brush Tech GmbH from the Westphalian city of Bad Wünnenberg. There are good reasons for this: Wöhler has been active in the brush industry for more than 75 years. The company provides a comprehensive system spectrum for manual or automated brush production that covers the entire process sequence – starting from injection molding (for bodies and fastening elements) and extrusion (for the bristles). Because the machines are completely modular in their design, they can be customized to specific requirements. This ensures reponsive engineering processes. Based on customer need, fast production speeds can also be realized: With a system that produces 60 flat brushes per minute, Wöhler holds the inofficial "world record" for brush production performance capabilities.

One notices two things when observing such a machine in operation. Firstly: Brush production requires a host of coordinated motions, many of which are highly dynamic and have short strokes. Secondly: Fines and dust from the cut bristles require a well conceived selection of the bearing locations.

This is where the Wöhler design engineers made a fundamental decision. They use igus® plain bearings from high-performance polymers in many rotating and linear bearing locations. Project manager and design engineer, Martin Dören: "In spite of the cutting dust, the bearings are maintenance-free, and no preventive maintenance is required. Our customers are therefore able to use these without trouble. " As particularly advantageous, Martin Dören points to the fact that bearing wear does not result in immediate failure, but instead becomes apparent gradually in the form of increased clearance. This protects the user from sudden production downtime and allows him to plan the bearing exchange as needed.

The range of the igus® bearings in use can be best described based on a machine type FP 900 B, which is currently in production. 40 handles for flat brushes are held in place on a central indexing table. Martin Dören designed the gripper from iglidur® bar stock : "We use bar stock that we machine in-house. The gripper design is very simple, requiring neither roller bearings nor cam rollers. “

iglidur® J, the fast and slow motion specialist among the bearing materials, is in use for this application. Wöhler uses iglidur® G more frequently. This material is the allrounder that is universally in use for medium to high loads, medium gliding speeds and medium temperatures. Generally, Wöhler tends to use iglidur® J for linear bearings and iglidur® G for rotating and swivel motions.

Due to the good experience, igus® plain bearings are always an option for the own product range of used machinery and also for customer service. For example, Wöhler reconfigured the existing drive systems on a customer's machine. Martin Dören: "The procured parts include a toothed belt drive with recirculating ball bearing guides that are used for filament production. We suggested equipping the axis with plain bearings and our rationale convinced the customer." “

The toothed belt drive is now guided by iglidur® J linear bearings; Wöhler milled the bearing supports in-house from bar stock. The results are compelling: On one machine that was already in use, the axes traveled a distance of 8,000 km after only 55 days – without apparent wear. igus® Sales Consultant, Marcus Kleine: "In cases such as these, we calculate the loads and service life very conservatively and recommended a live test. " The test was an all around success. In spite of high acceleration and high speeds, the iglidur® linear bearings are proving their value. However, for the sake of being accurate, we must add that these linear bearings are only used as guides and absorb neither transverse not torsional forces.