The BowMet range has been billed as the biggest advance in plain bearings in more than 70 years by the industry press, and quite rightly so. This new range of heavy-duty bearings offers a higher load capacity than any other proprietary plain bearing. Its heat, speed and corrosion capabilities combine to offer a high strength bearing that can stand up to even the harshest of conditions.

These heavy-duty bearings have been developed using ToughMet® material by Materion in the USA. The ToughMet material that BowMet is made from was used on the Mars Rover in 2011, so that should give you some idea of just how ‘tough’ ToughMet is!

With a static load of 820 N/mm2 and an impressive PV factor of 9.6, these heavy-duty bearings are ideally suited to a wide range of harsh industrial applications including:

• Mining & quarrying
• Heavy construction
• Motorsport
• Offshore oil & gas
• Marine

The ToughMet material resists saltwater corrosion, hydrogen embrittlement and chloride stress-corrosion cracking better than most copper alloys. Indeed, in some sulphide environments, the corrosion rate is comparable to stainless steel and nickel alloys.

The capacity to deliver increased reliability, reduced downtime, lower maintenance costs and ultimately fewer warranty claims mean that BowMet range of heavy-duty bearings really is nothing short of a revolution in bearing design and capability.