Flender and Weyenberg get in gear

In an important development in the gearbox sector, on 1 October the Siemens Mechanical Drives Unit was renamed Flender GmbH, and became a new, standalone company, wholly owned by Siemens.

Siemens Mechanical Drives Unit will be renamed Flender GmbH as of 1st October this year and will become a new, stand-alone company wholly-owned by Siemens

What’s new or renewed in the components and accessories field. This article looks at some recent developments.

Container crane makers based in Europe, Japan and Korea have proved remarkably tenacious in recent years despite the monumental rise of ZPMC. Probably, if ZPMC did not exist it would have been necessary to invent it, since without its prodigious crane building capacity and global reach the expansion in worldwide container trades could not have taken place.

Specialist gearbox manufacturers are focusing on a standardised crane range, but ZPMC uses a much wider range of gearbox designs.

The Port of Seattle recently approved a US$350,000 vibration and oil analysis testing programme to help try and identify the cause of repeated gearbox problems with the Flender gearboxes in its ZPMC cranes.