News

Thordon Bearings has indicated a polymer propeller shaft bearing lubricated by seawater could generate significantly less underwater radiated noise (URN) than metal bearings lubricated by oil. The Canadian polymer bearings specialist says the low URN of a ship operating with seawater-lubricated propeller shaft bearings is one of the reasons why the arrangement is favoured by the naval, cruise and fisheries sectors.

Thordon Bearings is supplying its grease-free, self-lubricating ThorPlas-Blue bearing material to a novel containerized wind propulsion system designed to reduce fuel consumption and fossil fuel emissions across all commercial ship types.

Global demand for raw materials is opening the door to a new market for Thordon Bearings, with one of the world’s largest mining companies, Grupo México, using the Canadian company’s grease-free and self-lubricating bearings in a myriad of pump and machinery applications. Since 2014, when Thordon’s Mexico-based distributor TZ Industrias first supplied and retrofitted ThorPlas-Blue bearings to vertical turbine pumps operating at its copper and ore mines in Sonora and Nacozari, Grupo México has continued to specify Thordon solutions for other equipment, including heavy industrial vehicles.

Corrosion Products & Equipment (CPE), a specialist engineering firm based in Rochester, New York State, has been appointed as an authorized distributor and service provider across Thordon Bearings’ marine, clean energy and industrial seals and bearings portfolio.

The shift towards more environmentally sustainable equipment is indicative in the increased interest Thordon Bearings has registered across its workboat portfolio, with the Canadian company reporting a large increase in orders for its water-lubricated RiverTough tailshaft bearings over the past three years. Orders for the company’s grease-free, self-lubricating ThorPlas Blue bearings, TG100 shaft seals, and pucker seals have also seen similar growth.

Thordon Bearings’ water-lubricated elastomeric polymer bearings have been installed to well pumps aboard an undisclosed offshore oil platform operated by Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC). Five KSB three-stage mixed flow impeller-type pumps were each retrofitted with Thordon pump bearings - 13 SXL intermediate bearings, four Composite bearings and a single SXL throttle bearing, replacing the original silicon carbide bushes.