How to avoid gel phenomenon of equipment lubricating oil?
January 01, 2023
Lubricating oil failure can occur in various situations, including gel phenomenon. The lubricating oil after gel is no longer liquid and has lost its fluidity. As you can imagine, this can not form effective lubrication, thus causing damage to the machinery. Only after you understand the causes of gel phenomenon and which oil is prone to this phenomenon, you can avoid this situation and make your equipment work normally and effectively.
Gel factor? Several factors need to be considered to analyze the working performance of a certain lubricating oil in low temperature environment and its gel trend in low temperature environment. It includes Base Oil, wax content, pour point and refining process of base oil. These factors have important effects on the lubricating oil gel and its low-temperature characteristics. If the operating temperature of your equipment is extremely low, you should pay attention to the base oil composition in the lubricating oil. Although mineral base oils are suitable for a variety of operating temperatures, people generally choose lubricants containing synthetic base oils. Synthetic lubricating oil generally has a high viscosity index, which means that it can maintain a certain fluidity in low temperature environment, and the viscosity increases when the temperature rises. If your machine needs to use mineral based lubricants, you have to distinguish between API base oil classification and base oil refining process. The underground crude oil has a certain amount of wax, and the wax will promote the lubricating oil to produce gel phenomenon at low temperature. Refining removes most of the wax. In the dewaxing process, the oil can be separated from the wax, or the wax structure can be transformed into another structure with good performance. In this way, the low-temperature performance of the lubricating oil will be improved. Generally speaking, the higher the refining degree of base oil, the higher the viscosity index, and the better the low-temperature performance. The viscosity and pour point of API II and III base oils are relatively low. When you don't know what kind of base oil in the product belongs to, you can ask the manufacturer or consult the technical data sheet. Another index, pour point, must be considered when selecting lubricating oil for use in low temperature environment. The pour point is the lowest temperature at which the oil can flow. When the temperature of the oil body drops, the liquid paraffin contained in it will form solid crystals, causing the oil to solidify and lose its fluidity. Even if the oil contains almost no wax, it also has a waxy pour point. If your machine is working in an extremely low temperature environment, and you have several lubricants with the same pour point and other indicators to choose, you should choose the one with the lowest pour point, so that you can avoid the decline in the fluidity of the oil body at low temperatures. Synthetic Base Oil is composed of several mixtures and generally does not contain paraffin. The pour point of synthetic base oil is lower than that of mineral base oil. Because of its high viscosity index and low pour point, synthetic base oil is generally used in low temperature environment. However, if the synthetic base oil is polluted by water, glycol and other substances, it may also have gel phenomenon. Therefore, conventional lubricating oil analysis is required to eliminate these "culprits".
How to avoid gel phenomenon? If you cannot find a lubricating oil that can maintain sufficient fluidity in low temperature environment, the common solution is to install a lubricating oil heater to avoid solidification or excessive viscosity. The lubricating oil heater can keep the oil at a certain temperature and fluidity, and can also reduce the pumping failure caused by excessive viscosity of the oil body. Wax melting heater, electric blanket and steam pipe are commonly used heating equipment to keep the lubricating oil at a stable temperature. If you plan to install a heater, you must pay attention that the heating temperature cannot be too high, otherwise the quality of lubricating oil will decline and the service life will be shortened. If you use a steam pipe, you must perform routine inspection to prevent water vapor pollution. How to use gel phenomenon? It is not always a bad thing that lubricating oil has gel tendency and is easy to be polluted at certain temperatures. In fact, this property can be used to clean up oil spills, especially in large areas of water. The Environmental Protection Agency uses gel agent to make the oil on the water surface form gel without reacting with water. They add gel to the oil slick on the water surface through mechanical agitation or wave rolling. Once gel phenomenon occurs in the oil slick, the impurities after reaction can be cleaned by filtration or other separation methods. Although not all lubricating oils will suffer from this phenomenon when they are polluted or at low temperatures, most problems caused by the viscosity of lubricating oils can be avoided through good pollution control procedures or by selecting appropriate lubricating oils for equipment. Conventional lubricating oil analysis can help detect the problems caused by oil gel and prevent the machine from being seriously damaged. If temperature control equipment such as heaters must be used, it is necessary to frequently check whether they have faults and check the oil temperature to prevent overheating. Sufficient care and care can make the lubricating oil used at low temperature last longer and prevent unnecessary mechanical damage.
