Drive system manufacturer Voith reports that decreasing costs and increasing production – priorities for maintaining competitiveness – are on every industry’s agenda in today’s environment of dwindling resources and surging costs.

The turbogear market, particulary, is a challenging environment for companies to operate in. “Therefore, we believe that our BHS high-performance turbogear and turbo parallel shaft gear units provide the services needed in companies’ uncompromising demands for quality and reliability,” says Voith South Africa (SA) energy, oil and gas divisional manager Derain Pillay.

“These factors play a vital role in achieving high plant availability and extended service performance,” continues Pillay.

The BHS gearbox range has contributed for more than 80 years in industries including mining, power generation, oil and gas, petrochemicals and chemical production.

The BHS gearboxes have an extended footprint on the African continent, from North Africa to Southern Africa, where about 300 BHS gearboxes operate in the mining and oil and gas industries. Voith SA supplies and services the full range of BHS turbo gearboxes.

Pillay highlights that the BHS gearbox range includes parallel shaft gearboxes and epicyclic, power distribution and integral gearboxes, as well as rotor turning gears and diaphragm couplings.

Voith Turbo parallel shaft gear units transmit high powers and speeds with increased efficiency and are commonly used to reduce the turbine-to-generator speed for powers up to about 85 MW or turbine speeds of about 60 000 rotations a minute.

“The basis for this capacity is the ability of an improved gear design with decades of experience and all current technical guidelines,” explains Pillay.

These gear units are suited to high-speed applications and designed for continuous operation and have proven themselves in many diverse turbomachinery and other applications, he notes.

Voith Turbo is an experienced manufacturer of planetary or epicyclic gear units, in accordance with the Stoeckicht principle – with this design, the unsupported sun wheel plus the unsupported radially elastic annulus halves effect an equal load distribution on the planets – which produces less wear and tear on the components for extended service life.

Manufactured up to powers of 45 MW, speeds of up to 80 000 rotations a minute and torques of over 550 kNm, with single-stage design ratios up to 12:1 and with two-stage ratios up to 80:1, Stoeckicht epicyclic gear units are used between all typical main engines and output machines within turbo trains, explains Pillay.

The BHS integral gearboxes feature standard and flexible designs that accommodate various requirements for power and speed. The units have the versatility to meet application requirements such as vent compressors, energy recycling, chemical and natural gas industries, refrigeration, compressed air plants, gas liquefaction, process compressors and expansion turbines.

“Tailor-made to the relevant application and customer specification, integral gear units are designed and manufactured with up to ten compressor stages, total unit weights of more than 40 t, and gear pitch wheel diameters of over 3 m,” notes Pillay.

“We recognise our customers’ goals to improve performance and productivity while reducing energy consumption and costs. To achieve this, the quality and reliability offered by the BHS range are prerequisites for success,” he points out.

“Product quality and reliability are only as good as the supporting levels of service, maintenance, and supply and availability of parts. We offer the full end-to-end service package to ensure end-users of increased uptime and extended gearbox life,” concludes Pillay.