Conveyor Belt Drive Roller

Production lines all over the world have a number of common key components to assist with mechanical handling of their finished or part finished items.  These are rollers and conveyors.

If the product is conveyed it would usually be via a belt which is driven by a roller,Known as a conveyor belt drive roller.  In most cases this roller will be rubber covered, and depending upon the conveying system and type of belt some conveyor rollers  will also be grooved. The grooving performs a number of functions such as gripping and centralising the belt.  The groove can be produced either by using C.N.C capability or manually by hand depending upon the complexity of the groove specification.

Fife engineering has recently refurbished a conveyor belt drive roller for an international confectioner. Our customer depends on us to supply a roller that meets both his specification and  food hygiene regulations.  The rubber  therefore has to be FDA (Food and Drug Administration) approved for use in an environment where it may come into contact with food.

After sourcing the  rubber Fife Engineering bonds the rubber to the prepared steel stock by a vulcanising process.  After  vulacnising the roller  is proof ground in preparation for grooving.  Once the roller has been grooved it is finish ground, cleaned  and inspected.

Hand grooving

Finish grinding

Finished groove pattern

            

Maintaing high standards of welding.

As our customer base continues to grow the demands on Fife Engineering skill level increases, no more so than in our welding ability.

We are well known for producing high quality rollers and precision engineered components to the highest standards, but more and more our customers contact Fife Engineering with projects that require high quality welding.

So much so that we have invested a high percentage of our resources to maintain our welders qualification to BS EN 287 (ASME IX). We are working with Lloyds Register and The Welding Institute (TWI) to assure our welders continue to maintain their high standards and are currently qualified on a range of materials including,

50D
RQT
Mild Steel
Stainless steel among others using various welding techniques on a wide range of material thickness from 3mm to 70mm for open and closed butts and 5mm upwards for fillet welds on tube or plate.

Laminating Rollers

Glue Manufacturers are constantly re-formulating glues and adhesives, mostly as a result of customer demands. Given that there are glues and adhesives for paper, laminates, wood, and various textiles etc, it is understandable that as new glues come on line then a new range of rubber and silicone covered rollers must also be available to apply these glues. This process is known as laminating.

Fife Engineering is at the forefront of rubber and silicone roller manufacture for the laminating process. With a range of Neoprene’s and Nitriles for PVA glues and several high quality Silicones and EPDM Silicones for hot melt polyurethane glues Fife Engineering is able to offer the correct roller for your laminating application.

Finish grinding

Final inspection

Mobile Climbing Wall.

This year Fife Engineering have manufactured two mobile climbing walls. We were commissioned by a local climbing wall manufacturer to look at the possibility of attaching a climbing wall to a mobile trailer. After many hours of head scratching we had an initial design, which was acceptable to our customer, and began to fabricate the framework.

The design involved several engineering disciplines fabricating, turning, milling, welding and hydraulics which eventually saw the framework raised into the air. There were several elements to consider, which we identified during the manufacturing of the first mobile climbing wall, which stood seven metres high when raised. We had to consider the overall weight to identify the correct hydraulic cylinder to fit, this also dictated the correct trailer to manufacture.

 Stability and safety were also key factors in the design, these factors dictated which materials were used and the foot print of the wall when in its raised position.

Mobile Climbing Wall in its transporting position

Here you can see the Cliumbing Wall begining to be raised into the air.

Here you can see the Climbing Wall being raised into its up right position.

The Mobile Climbing Wall, up right and ready for use!

Let Fife Help You Care For Your Rollers

How hard are you being hit by the credit crunch not to mention the recession? After weeks and weeks of doom and gloom and little prospect of better times for quite a while yet we’re all looking for ways of getting that “extra mile” out of our machines and equipment. If only we could make this or that last a little longer before replacement or refurbishment! Well maybe we can add a little feelgood factor to the equation. 

Lets’ talk about rollers, yes rollers and in particular your rollers. Did you know that you can get more out of them by merely storing them correctly and did you know that by not fitting and handling them correctly you will shorten their lifespan considerably. So maybe you store them on the floor in your office, or maybe you lean them up against a wall balancing only on the journal end? Or do you lie them on the shelve without supporting the journal ends. All these methods of storage will not only shorten the working life of your roller but in many instances will damage the roller or cause serious “flat” on the surface. 

Rollers are essential components in your production and we can help you get the best out of them by passing on a few handy tips regarding handling and storage. 

Keep all your rollers in a controlled environment and do not expose them to extremes in temperature variation. 

Never store your rollers outside or in direct sunlight as surface finish will be impaired and performance compromised. 

Coated rollers are fragile and usually expensive components and should never be placed flat on the floor but should be supported using V-Blocks upon which the journals can be supported. We can supply V-Blocks if you wish. 

Larger rollers are heavy and are best left in their purpose built transportation boxes until required for use. 

Always leave the Fife Engineering protective covering on the roller until you are ready to install the component. 

Never leave your rollers stacked on the floor or hard surface or lying against one another as this will result in “flat” spots forming on the roller surface. If this happens your roller will probably need to be reground. 

The above are but a few handy tips to help you get improved performance and longer life out of your rollers. Fife Engineering will be happy to visit your site/plant and offer advise on roller storage and handling. A little time and thought taken upon receipt of your roller can save you money in the long run and let’s face it we all need all the help we can get at the moment! 

A little story to ponder on! Back in the summer (if you can call it that) we were asked to manufacture some mobile shower fabrications. Yes you may think it a strange request but in the end they were a great success when used strategically placed at the Great North Run in October. So when the going got tuff, the tuff took a run through shower!! And ……….. 

everyone had a great day and lots of money was raised to help so many people. 

to save image above right click and follow instructions

does not look very mobile

 

dressed ready to go

Fife Engineering: The GreenPower Project

The Greenpower project

 

 

 

During 2007 Fife engineering was asked to fabricate a chassis for the George Stephenson High School In Killingworth Tyne and Wear. The chassis was fabricated using a design modled by the year nine students at the school. It was for a car which was to be entered into a race at the Croft circuit near Darlington Co Durham.The race was held in September 2007 and the results where very favourable. Since then the car has been back to Fife Engineering for modifications including the fabrication and welding of a new sub frame. The students have entered the car into another race on the 16th July 2008 again at Croft and we look forward to hearing of their success. Fife Engineering are also delighted to recieve three students from the school to our factory in Swalwell for one weeks work experiance.

Fife Engineering The Story Begins

Hello and welcome to our  factory blog. We hope to give a more informal detailed overview on all the facets of engineering we can do at Fife Engineering and the people behind the company.

We are all immensely proud of this company and its own unique story, both ongoing and from the past. We hope to tell you this story in this blog. A gripping tail of precision engineered products, jet fighters and climbing walls .

The company has for over 50 years done just about everything in engineering terms and the fact we are still in business after all these years means we must be doing something right

However at the core of the company is a focus on our customers and their exact needs. Thus to some extent every job is a bespoke job, tailored to the demands of each individual order. This is the advantage of to borrow a famous slogan “being big enough to cope and small enough to care..”

Over the next few months we aim to post regularly and hopefully build up a picture of the company and all the many skills we can offer in a wide range of engineering tasks from precision engineering, roller refurbishment, welding and  fabricating, roller manufacture etc.

You will hopefully meet some of the people behind this great company and hear their own personal stories.