Effect of Rolling Bearing Refurbishment and Restoration on Bearing Life and Reliability

For nearly four decades it has been a practice in commercial and military aircraft application that rolling-element bearings removed at maintenance or overhaul be reworked and returned to service. The work presented extends previously reported bearing life analysis to consider the depth (Z45) to maximum shear stress (τ45) on stressed volume removal and the effect of replacing the rolling elements with a new set. A simple algebraic relationship was established to determine the L10 life of bearing races subject to bearing rework. Depending on the extent of rework and based on theoretical analysis, representative life factors for bearings subject to rework ranged from 0.87 to 0.99% of the lives of new bearings. Based on bearing endurance data, 92% of the bearing sets that would be subject to rework would result in L10 lives equaling and/or exceeding that predicted for new bearings, with the remaining 8% having the potential to achieve the analytically predicted life of new bearings when one of the rings is replaced at rework. The potential savings from bearing rework varies from 53 to 82% that of new bearings depending on the cost, size, and complexity of the bearing.

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