Summer brings to mind, sunglasses, ice cream, hot days and heat-caused failures to Indramat servo drives.
Heat can lead to different problems with drives, but the most common is failure of the powered fan. Fan failure can be a big deal. If the fan stops working the drive will age at an accelerated rate. Every week that you run a drive without a working fan is like running it a year with a working fan. If your unit is in an area with regulated conditions the aging won’t be quite as serious — about a year of aging for every two weeks. That’s still not good.
There are a couple of things you can do to promote longevity and prevent Indramat failures.
Be sure to put your fan on a regular and frequent schedule for inspection. Have the machine operator check to make sure the fan is working properly each time the machine is started. This can be done as simply as looking at the fan through a mirror. Supposing that the machine is never shut down, you can do a preventative maintenance check every week or every two weeks.
You should also consider replacing fans if your machine is over 10 years old. This is a preventative measure that can save you a lot of trouble in the long run. If you’re fan has been running for 10 years, it deserves a pat on the back. That’s quite a while for a fan and you’ve gotten your money’s worth from it.
Another thing to think about is your cabinets. If you consider the cost of downtime and repair, the cost of installing a sealed air conditioner on a cabinet starts to looks more than reasonable. Otherwise you’ll find yourself positioning regular fans on your cabinets trying to cool them down. That’s like trying to cool an entire extra-large pizza by blowing in it. While it’s still in the oven…
You can still find original 1980’s Indramat TDM drives efficiently operating in plants that run regular fan checks and make use of air conditioned cabinets.
If it’s too late for prevention, call us now and we can help.