Location
Belgium
Industry
Metal Recycling
Manual greasing creates hidden risk
Hard-to-reach pumps get greased too late or not at all, leading to bearing failures, seal leakage, and unplanned downtime.
Automated greasing, consistent protection
The Pulsa™ system doses grease at controlled intervals, reaching pumps up to 5 metres away. No gaps, no operator dependency.
From daily rounds to twice a year
Daily greasing was eliminated entirely. Two cartridge replacements per year now replace a repetitive, resource-intensive task.
Challenge
At a metals‑processing facility in Belgium, several slurry pumps were installed in remote areas of the plant. Lubricating these pumps required significant manual effort during daily rounds, making the process time-consuming and costly. As a result, greasing was often delayed or skipped.
That led to two issues:
- Undergreased bearings lead to early bearing failure
- For pumps where the shaft seal requires lubrication, insufficient lubrication led to excessive leakage and reduced seal lifetime.
Lubricating these components is a repetitive and time-consuming task that requires significant manpower. As a result, it is not always carried out with the necessary precision, increasing the risk of bearing and seal failures and, consequently, a higher likelihood of unplanned downtime.
Solution
Vaikon assessed the lubrication pattern across all affected pumps and implemented a Pulsa™ automatic greasing system, configured for the pump’s labyrinths, bearings and lantern‑ring positions (where applicable). The Pulsa system provides:
- Fully automatic dosing of grease at controlled intervals, reducing the peaks and gaps typical of manual greasing.
- Consistent film thickness on bearings and seals, preventing both over‑ and underlubrication.
- 7.5 bar discharge pressure, enabling remote mounting up to 5 meters away, ideal for pumps located in remote zones.
- Cartridge replacement only twice per year, instead of daily greasing rounds.
Custom lubrication schedule
Vaikon always develops a pump-specific lubrication schedule for its customers, indicating:
- which lubrication points must be serviced (bearings, labyrinth seals, lantern ring if present),
- which grease type is required (EP2 as standard),
- required quantity per point,
- correct interval based on RPM (Revolutions Per Minute), frame size and daily operating hours.
This schedule ensures that the Pulsa units deliver exactly the volume the pump needs.
Result
The automated lubrication setup stabilised pump performance and has prevented any lubrication‑related failures since installation. By eliminating the need for daily manual greasing rounds, maintenance has been reduced to just two cartridge replacements per year, resulting in significant time and cost savings.
With consistent lubrication levels across all pumps (regardless of operator availability), the risk of component failure has been substantially reduced. This allows more predictable maintenance planning and ensures reliable pump operation, even in remote areas where manual intervention was previously inefficient and resource-intensive.
