Do you have repeated belt failures or failure of drive end bearing for a motor? Do you have rotor gap issues or repeated electrical failure motor driving a machine by belt? Pulley or sheave misalignment is a leading cause of failure for belt and chain-driven machines!
Pieces of broken belt / powder on the floor
The traditional methods are not good enough!
+ Many maintenance personnel have the misconception that precise pulley alignment is not necessary
+ Some think the alignment done using a thread or even a straight edge is good enough for the machine.
+ Others believe belts "can take" the misalignment.
+ The above photo is from a site where the maintenance team did the pulley alignment using thread and straight edge after belt replacement. Luckily one of the cleaners found some black powder on the clean floor (something very rare in a plant) and notified the maintenance personnel.
The effect of non-precise pulley alignment
+ Repeated belt failures/ high belt wear causing frequent belt replacement.
+ High wear of pulleys or sheaves. So, pulleys cannot reach their intended life period.
+ Repeated bearing failures, especially for the drive-end bearings in Motors.
+ Electrical issues such as changes in rotor gap for motors, causing motor failure of reduced efficiency.
+ Machine downtime caused by the above failures.
+ Increased maintenance costs.
The Solution - Pulley Laser Alignment
The below photo is from the same site where belt "powders" or pieces were found. We can see the pulley is misaligned by a 3-5 mm. This was impossible to detect with the thread or straight-edge method!
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