Sustainable practices are becoming commonplace and lubrication across a variety of industries is no longer a necessary evil. This article explores the igus solution.
Every year £180 billion is spent on lubricants worldwide – the need for lubrication isn’t what it once was, with alternative solutions available that companies like igus continue to demonstrate. There is now a way to determine who can immediately eliminate lubricants and AI can play a role in this journey to “Go Zero” lubrication.
Lubricants are as much a part of everyday industrial life as a cup of coffee every morning, but billions of pounds worth of machine downtime is caused each year due to insufficient lubrication. igus bundles 60 years of motion plastics knowledge combined with hundreds of thousands of test data and millions of applications into an AI driven app that immediately guides users to lubrication-free motion in their machine. From excavators to farm tractors and water turbines, everything has already been solved and proven.
So far, there has been no talk of a lubricant-free world when it comes to the most important innovations of the future. However, a study by RWTH Aachen University proved the positive influence that lubrication-free plastics has on the profitability and sustainability of companies. An example from the study of a world-renowned beer company shows that by using lubrication-free polymer bearings in all conveyor belts at the 160 locations, the company could save over £5million annually in lubricant and personnel costs, making the change to self-lubricating parts a switch that is worth considering.
The positive environmental impact is also considerable: CO2 equivalents of 28,814 kg could be saved annually. This year, igus presented 247 new products and showed how everyone can “Go Zero” lubrication with the help of AI. The igusGO app, which was shown for the first time last year, makes this possible with voice, photo or text, so users can now immediately access the proven solutions at various points in their own application and 600 others. If an application isn’t available, it can be requested via AI chat in the app, and you are guaranteed to get an answer. As previously mentioned, this AI is based on data from millions of applications of igus products from the last decades. It provides functions to calculate the service life in the respective customer scenario – based on hundreds of thousands of test values from the in-house laboratory.
“It’s amazing what role AI is now playing,” says Rob Dumayne, Director of Plain Bearings and Linear Technology at igus UK. The importance of providing cost-effective and sustainable ways to replace lubricants is becoming increasingly recognised. All of the test data collated over the last decade on transitioning to “Zero Lubrication” is available within an easy and accessible tool for everyone in the industry. The crucial role that lubricants once played in the industry is therefore reducing with the rise of self-lubricating options. Manufacturers that are making the switch to lubrication-free practices are seeing results now in the way of less unplanned downtime, and equipment failure but will also be better positioned for the future as new environmental regulations come into force.
Find out more about GO ZERO at igus here.
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