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Crane emergency hoist brakes are an important safety feature for any operation making critical lifts. Thankfully, these industrial braking systems which are most commonly seen in steel mill applications are increasingly being adopted by operators across industries who take a proactive approach to safety.

Emergency hoist brakes prevent accidents by stopping a load from falling in the event of a failure of a crane hoist mechanism. Root causes of the hoist failure range from a broken input shaft, to a input shaft brake failure (often due to either improper adjustment or not having automatic lining wear compensation), to a various types of gearbox and low-speed shaft failures. In any situation where you depend only on a motor brake, you are exposed to failures where the connection between the motor and hoist rope drum is severed. Such catastrophic failures can create a hazardous situation leading to equipment damage or, worse, loss of life. The solution to this dangerous situation lies in installing an emergency safety brake on the output side of the system, either on the gearbox output shaft or the hoist rope drum flange.

Below, our industrial brake experts weigh in on various aspects of emergency brakes used on crane hoists in a variety of industries and applications.

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A crane brake upgrade provides crane owners/operators a way to keep their equipment working safely, reliably, and without the typical headaches caused by old and obsolete crane brakes.

Often, decades old cranes are still operational, but the original brakes have become obsolete with spare parts needed for repair either no longer available or prohibitively expensive. In such cases, we support our customers with a crane brake upgrade by retrofitting a modern industrial brake in place of the old brake. By upgrading their old crane brakes, customers are able to meet the latest industry standards and improve the performance and reliability of their crane. Additionally, with the new crane brakes installed, we can provide the customer with technical support, service, spare parts, and repairs for decades to come.

Below, we outline key considerations when upgrading and replacing old crane brakes:

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Bearings are the lifeblood of an industrial vibrator. Assuming a vibrator has been properly sized for an application and mounted correctly, bearing maintenance will likely determine the life you get out of the vibrator.

In this blog, we’ll share our thoughts on what’s important when it comes to bearings for rotary electric industrial vibrators.

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Choosing the best industrial vibrator for your application is critical. In fact, improper sizing is one of the leading causes of industrial vibrator motor failure that we see.

While we are always happy to assist you, we wanted to share some of the science that underlies properly sizing and applying a rotary electric vibrator.

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Certain types of conveyors require fail-safe brakes for stopping. These conveyors, often used in the mining and aggregate industries, include downhill conveyors (e.g., discharge and transfer conveyors), as well as overland conveyors with downhill sections. Not having fail-safe brakes on these types of conveyors can result in catastrophic damage if power is lost. For example, overspeed can result in damage to drive system components, clogging of chutes at transfer points, or general safety issues stemming from performing an e-stop. Some unique considerations related to designing a conveyor brake system include:

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We recently summarized the most common industrial vibrator failure modes that we see. In our 35+ years of working with heavy duty industrial vibrators, improper mounting is consistently the single leading root cause of industrial vibrator failure. Because improper mounting has a tendency to cause a wide range of issues with vibratory equipment, our customers are often surprised to learn that an error in the vibrator installation process is the true culprit. To help you avoid this pain, let’s dive into more detail on how to properly mount your rotary electric industrial vibrator:

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A holding or e-stop brake is used to keep a drive system from moving once the variable frequency drive has reached a near stop (i.e., near zero RPM shaft speed). In a holding or e-stop braking application, the brake generally isn’t used to stop the system except for emergency situations. The brake is always fail-safe, meaning that it is spring applied and will set itself in the event of a power failure.

Below is a summary of how we determine the best fail-safe holding or e-stop brake for our customers’ industrial applications:

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Industrial vibrators are unique pieces of equipment. While often associated with electric motors, industrial vibrators have vastly different mechanical and electrical characteristics and can wreak havoc on your operation if misapplied and misunderstood. So that you know what to look for, below are the most common causes of failure that we see:

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