Roxtec delivers a broad range of cable and pipe seals for factory and industrial equipment across the globe. Its products are designed to withstand ultra-tough conditions, helping save space while sealing everything from flat cables to pneumatic pipes. Roxtec UK Managing Director Clive Sharp explains the importance of protecting factory equipment and the broad range of applications which require effective sealing. The process is further brought to life through a case study involving a tailor-made solution for global servo-motor manufacturer Yaskawa Europe at a robotics plant in Germany.
Roxtec is a world leader in the design and manufacture of cable and pipe sealing solutions for factory and industrial equipment. The firm was founded in Sweden in 1990 and is today active in more than 80 markets. Roxtec’s products are used to protect people, buildings and equipment from multiple hazards. And there are many to consider with cable entries including lightning, gas, fire, dust, flood, humidity, rodents, electro-magnetic disturbances and the risk of explosion. While traditional sealing systems only tend to protect against one particular hazard, Roxtec’s solutions are designed to withstand a plethora of dangers. Its key market sectors include marine, oil and gas, telecoms, construction, power generation, distribution and transmission and the process industries.
In the last two decades, the firm has developed a strong reputation for its work in the global manufacturing sector and in particular cable and pipe seals for factory machinery. It provides solutions across a broad range of application areas including cabinets, cable management, control cabinets, HMI (Human Machine Interface), junction boxes, motor control centers, pneumatics, power distribution panels and robotics.
Openable seals and standardising designs
Roxtec’s lightweight seals are area efficient and ideal for cabinets, enclosures, junction boxes and other applications with high cable density. They are designed to protect equipment with an organized cable entry seal which can be opened for easy maintenance and equipment upgrades. The openable seal design provides a solution for top or bottom high cable density entries to cabinets in harsh and high temperature environments. They meet international safety requirements and allow for changes in cable schedules or for additional cables.
Roxtec’s sealing solutions can be used for all types of cables within power and control and by machine builders in various challenging and demanding applications. By further standardising cable seals, designers are able to handle high cable density and plan for future needs. This can involve replacing many pneumatic fittings, cable glands and cord grips with just a few conduit seals. Standardizing also enables designers to seal multiple cables of different sizes, even pre-terminated ones, in each opening.
A tailor-made solution – Yaskawa Europe
A recent project requiring a durable and flexible cable seal solution for factory equipment involved Yaskawa Europe’s manufacturing plant in Germany. When developing new paint and door opener robots, Yaskawa Europe realised it did not only need cable entry seals for bonding, grounding and protection against gas, dust and explosion, it also needed spare capacity for more cables. During the development process, it became clear to the Yaskawa designers and engineers that it would neither be space nor cost-efficient to use big cable glands in metal plates. It would be too hard for system integrators and end-users to drill new holes and add cables if needed.
In this case the system integrator, Eisenmann, was looking for a solution that would allow easy addition of cables. After investigating many cable sealing solutions, very few had all the features that were required, such as being certified for classified explosive areas.
Sealing solution on demand
Yaskawa selected Roxtec as a possible supplier. There was, however, a challenge: the standard Roxtec seals would not fit the special opening designed for the previously used cable gland plate. Meanwhile, time was running – and the day for the very first delivery was rapidly approaching. Roxtec delivered a customized SFX BG Ex seal to Yaskawa Europe as soon as the certification documents needed were available. The cables used include power cables, encoder cables and air hoses for the robot as well as an application cable from the customer side.
The Yaskawa paint robot MOTOMAN MPX3500 and door opener robot MOTOMAN MPO10 were later presented at the Automatica tradeshow in Munich – equipped with Roxtec cable entry seals and certification labels demonstrating their high level of performance. The solution and response from Roxtec was well received by Yaskawa because it was fast and efficient. This is important due to Yaskawa’s short lead-in times for product development and delivery. The firm further sent samples back to colleagues in Japan, who are now using Roxtec products.
For more details, contact Roxtec UK at Waterfold Business Park, Bury Tel: 0161 761 5280 Email info@uk.roxtec.com or go online at: www.roxtec.com