Machinery Lubrication magazine published by Noria Corporation
Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/1522439
62 Machinery Lubrication Annual Edition | www . machinerylubrication.com Aluminum Complex Barium Calcium Calcium 12- Hydroxy Calcium Complex Clay Lithium Lithium 12- Hydroxy Lithium Complex Polyurea* Sodium Calcium Sulphonate Silica Aluminum Complex Barium Calcium N/A N/A Calcium 12-Hydroxy N/A N/A Calcium Complex Clay (Bentone) Lithium Lithium 12-Hydroxy N/A Lithium Complex Poiyurea* Sodium Calcium Sulphonate N/A N/A N/A Silica N/A N/A N/A N/A end user, you should verify this directly with the standard issuing organization or the OEM. ere are occasions when the new supplier lubricants cannot be verified against the standards they claimed. is is because some industry bodies and OEMs do not issue approvals to specific brands. eir standards are meant to be adhered to by lubricant manufacturers, and the onus is on the manu - facturers to prove that their products meet the standards. When standards cannot be verified, you may have to rely on the credibility of the oil supplier. Is there a justification to trust them? What information and track record do you have with them and their products? Is there any reference customer for whom you can get the information? Is there performance data on the successful use of new lubricant in similar machines and conditions? In the absence of the above, you will need to evaluate the lubricant quality and performance through product testing. Commercial laboratories can perform stan - dard tests such as viscosity, metal elements, AN/BN and particle count. e readings can give you a basic idea of the typical prop- erties and composition of the new lubricant. However, to truly know its performance, advanced tests are required. is means you need access to specialized testing labs. Often- times, costs and time prohibit most companies from doing this. Alternatively, you can conduct a product trial in your plant. Choose the least critical machines and run the new lubricant over a pre-determined period. Monitor machine and oil conditions via oil analysis. It is worthwhile to shorten the sampling intervals for early detection of abnormalities. Should the trial on the least critical machines show promising results, you can increase to more machines and more critical ones. Compatibility Risk e new lubricants could be incompatible with the previous ones when mixed in a storage tank, potentially resulting in poor lubricant performance and other associated reliability issues. Mitigating this risk requires a compat - ibility assessment between new and current oils based on understanding their oil type, base oil, additive and for grease (thickener) composition. ere are general rules of thumb to deter - mine compatibility between products. Starting with the base oil, synthetics such as PAO and diesters are generally compatible with mineral oils. PAGs, however, are not. For engine oils, mixability between the same API classification and SAE viscosity grade shouldn't be an issue. For other oils, incompatibility is often due to mixing acidic and alkaline additive technologies together. Mixing these two types will cancel each other. As a result, solid substances will form, changing the oil's physical and chemical properties. is is likely to occur if mixing different oil types, for example, engine oil and turbine oil. Although it is not common to purposely mix different oil types, incompatibility still can happen for similar types, such as mixing zinc-based and non-zinc hydraulic oils. Check with your oil supplier to identify whether or not their products fall under acidic and alkaline additive technologies. As for grease, thickener compatibility is the most crucial. Grease NLGI consistency will be affected when incompatible soap thickeners come into contact with each other. With many different thickeners out there, a grease compatibility table should be referenced. is is presented in Table 1: Legend: Compatible Borderline Compatible Incompatible Table 1: Grease Compatibility Chart * Not all polyurea greases are mutually compatible LUBRICANT PROPERTIES