Crane Packing Limited

Samuel C Wilkinson

Thomas W Bunyan

Ronald Sydney Sweett

In a mechanical face seal for producing a fluid tight seal between a pair of relatively rotatable components a first sealing element is associated with one of said components and is fixed axially with respect thereto; a second sealing element is associated with the other component and is movable axially with respect thereto; means is provided for sealing the second sealing element with respect to its associated component and loading it axially into sealing engagement with the first sealing element and a thrust bearing is provided between the sealing element to partially reduce the load applied thereto.

Mechanical face seals

A seal assembly primarily for use with the stern bearing of a ship comprises inner and outer face seal elements mounted on a rubber body for rotation with the propeller shaft. Any oil from the bearing which leaks past the inner element, or sea water which leaks past the outer element, enters a void space formed by pockets in the rubber body. These pockets are separated by inclined vanes which act as a centrifugal pump to expel the leakage material through a passage in a seat for the seals. The assembly can also be used in other applications where the leakage material is corrosive or is likely to cause blockages.

Rotary mechanical seals

An axially movable seal face member of a rotary mechanical face seal, for example for a ship's stern shaft, is sealed to its associated structure, and at the same time loaded axially, by the wedging action of a ring urged radially between two oppositely inclined annular surfaces on bodies associated with the member and the structure, either the ring or the surfaces or both being of resilient material. The ring could be a rubber O-ring and the surfaces could be two further O-rings. Alternatively the ring could be rigid, or the ring could be resilient but the other two surfaces rigid.

Rotary mechanical face seals

In a stern seal and bearing assembly for the stern shaft of a ship there is an oil seal assembly at the outboard end of the bearing and a sea water seal (preferably a face seal) axially spaced from it, with a drain from the space between the two, and the oil seal assembly comprises a pair of lip seals directed towards each other with a drain from the space between them. The oil supply to the bearing can be at low pressure, for example simply the static head from a tank slightly above the level of the bearing, and the last-mentioned drain may have a swan neck above the oil level.

Growing community of inventors

Chichester, United Kingdom

Samuel C Wilkinson