March 22, 2006

By: Mark Harris
Website: http://www.bearing-n-bearings.com

Blessey Marine Service, Inc. of New Orleans, Louisiana has specified water lubricated Thordon composite propeller shaft bearings

Blessey Marine Service, Inc. of New Orleans, Louisiana has specified water lubricated Thordon Composite propeller shaft bearings in a series of five new push boats being added to their existing fleet of 25 towboats. According to Mitch Jones, Maintenance Manager of Towboats and New Construction at Blessey Marine, "Thordon Composite bearings have shown excellent performance in all our vessels where they have been installed." A Thordon user since 1991, Blessey Marine is an inland waterways tank barge company transporting chemicals, clean petroleum products, residual products and asphalt throughout the US inland waterways using a modern fleet of double skinned barges. By the end of 2001, Blessey will be operating a fleet of 30 towboats.

Mitch's first exposure to Thordon bearings was at Verret Shipyard in Louisiana, where he heard that Composite performed well in silt laden and abrasive water conditions. "We decided to try Thordon Composite on Charles W. Clark and after six years of service the bearings are still operating," Mitch recalled, "and another one of our vessels, Bill McNeill, also still has the original Thordon prop shaft bearings that were installed in 1996." Mitch says, "We are continuing to upgrade the cutless rubber bearings in all of our existing fleet to Thordon Composite. Thordon is easy to install via freeze fitting and we get good technical support from Thordon and our local Thordon distributor, Marine Industries Corporation (MIC). "

MIC has worked with Blessey Marine over the years helping them solve a number of bearing-related problems. Jim Bright, MIC Sales Manager, recalls an experience with Bennie Dupnick, a towboat that Blessey Marine rebuilt in 1996 incorporating a heavy five bladed propeller. "The cutless prop shaft bearings originally installed during the refit were crushed after six months of operation due to the high loading resulting from the heavy propeller," says Jim. "We recommended Thordon Composite to Mitch because of its superior loadcarrying ability compared to rubber and the bearings were installed in February, '97. Thordon

Dreama Klaiber worked well until January '98, when a rope wrapped on the shaft, cutting off the water flow and wiping the bearing. We replaced it with another Thordon Composite bearing which is still running well today."

"Blessey Marine is just one of a number of high profile operators on the inland water system benefiting from Thordon Composite's increased wear life," says Allen Taylor, Area Sales Manager for Thordon Bearings. "Over the past ten years we have fitted Thordon to hundreds of vessels running in the tough, abrasive conditions of America's inland river system and found that, typically, Thordon outlasts rubber by a factor of at least 2 to 1. Average wear is in the range of 0.010" to 0.015" (0.25 to 0.38 mm) per year of operation, however, it is important that a hardened shaft sleeve such as Nickel Chrome Boron be used in combination with a Composite bearing to get the best results." Mitch said, "Due to Blessey Marine's focus on meeting our customer's delivery expectations, we are currently working out a plan with MIC to carry bearing inventory for our vessels to minimize our turnaround time in the event of an unscheduled drydocking." Jim added, "To improve our service to Blessey Marine and our other customers in Louisiana and Mississippi, MIC opened a regional office in the New Orleans area last October. Mitch concluded "We plan on continuing to use Thordon prop shaft bearings in our boats and we have just started to specify grease-free Thordon SXL rudder and jockey arm bearings as well."

About The Author:

Mark Harris is a successful author and regular contributor to http://www.bearing-n-bearings.com.  Keep things running smoothly with ball bearings, roller bearings, ball thrust bearings and tapered bearings.