Industry 4.0 means preventative solutions for maintenance

Chain guides, belt guides, sliding guides, and slide bars: Whatever the form in which this product type appears, the name "Murtfeldt" is inevitably linked with it.

The Dortmund-based manufacturer and processor of plastics, who is again exhibiting at this year's Motek, at Stand 3215 in Hall 3, introduced its established product for the drive and conveyor technology field to the market in the 1960s, and has developed it constantly since then. Murtfeldt chain and belt guides protect chains and belts at the same time as ensuring excellent running properties and high wear resistance. With a long lifetime, no need for maintenance, and no expiration date, they are also a fixed component of machines and plants in the context of Industry 4.0.

The digitalization of machine elements is progressing faster and faster. Thanks to the fact that electronic components are becoming more cost-effective, it will no longer be a problem to make even simple elements such as chain tensioners more and more intelligent.

For example, parts of Murtfeldt's chain tensioning systems already have intelligent components today. It's only a matter of time until the preventative maintenance of the future using intelligent components will be completely normal – and the Murtfeldt chain tensioner will come to call when chains need adjusting or other problems pop up on chain drives.

Murtfeldt is also considering how to give its semi-finished products intelligent features, too, so that certain electrical properties change when under load, for example, making the plastic itself into a sensor.

Furthermore, some important requirements are placed upon plastics in the Industry 4.0 era: Demand tends to favour as low a weight as possible whilst retaining high strength. Optimum slide properties help to reduce CO² emissions. In addition, the wear resistance of the material should ensure low maintenance efforts. These are requirements that Murtfeldt's plastics, and particularly the Material "S"^® plus group, already fulfil today.