Swing Bearing Systems for Cranes and Excavators

Demands for greater capacity per unit size necessitate increasingly careful consideration of mounting structures and fasteners in swing bearing selection. In order that the task be approached as intelligently as possible, this paper brings equipment designers up to date on swing bearing design. Mounting structures, bearings, and fasteners should be considered as an interdependent system to determine design requirements and application limitations. Accordingly, different bearing types are discussed and methods for calculating their capacity are presented. A test procedure which is being used to gain additional knowledge of optimum swing bearing system design is outlined.