Frans Odendaal, SKF product manager for Power Transmission, argues that the quality to price ratio of SKF-branded components and solutions is the lowest available, either making equivalent quality products more expensive, or similarly priced products inferior with respect to material and manufacturing quality.
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Heading up the Power Transmission product line at SKF, Frans Odendaal says that SKF strives to offer a complete and integrated range of high quality drive components and kits, including belts, chains, couplings, pulleys, sprockets, bushings and bearings.
“Power transmission solutions are required in virtually every industry to enable machinery to keep running smoothly,” he says. “We believe that, by choosing SKF power transmission products, clients are investing in high quality, high performance solutions that will enable their machinery to run more efficiently with less frequent failures.
“In addition, we are able to offer Tier 1 quality products at prices normally associated with lower Tier equivalents,” he tells MechChem Africa. “We have never been box movers,” he continues. “For us, the SKF brand represents quality, but we do not believe that any of our competitors can better our quality to price ratio. While our quality is not in question, there are other brands that are also perceived as high-end, but the price of these top-end brands is significantly higher than quality-comparable SKF components.
“Looking at this another way, if products are compared based on price, we believe that comparatively priced competitor components are almost always of inferior quality. And we can prove this. There are different manufacturing procedures and standards involved in producing Tier 1 and Tier 2 transmission chain, for example. Our brand ticks the requirements for Tier 1, while similarly priced equivalents tend to skip some of these key quality manufacturing procedures,” he explains.
As evidence, he points to some of the key features of SKF Power Transmission chain components – inner and outer link plates, pins, bushings and rollers – and the associated manufacturing processes.
“A key mistake people make when comparing different drive component options is they look at catalogue entries for load and power ratings. But it is seldom that a chain, for example, will fail due to load. The life of a quality component is more directly related to its wear resistance, and it is the more subtle aspects of material and design that govern a product’s wear life.
“SKF’s published load ratings are exceptionally conservative as well, but with respect to life, the materials used, the sealing and lubrication solutions and the robustness of the designs matter much more,” Odendaal says.
Solutions for the agricultural industry
As part of an innovation drive across SKF’s EMEA region, SKF South Africa is working on a number of new market offerings for the Agri industry to simplify and reduce the seasonal refurbishment costs of farm equipment,” Odendaal informs MechChem Africa.
All farm equipment has to endure harsh conditions: mud, dust and debris; extreme heat and cold; rain and runoff; corrosive chemicals; and long periods of inactivity followed by intense periods of work. In addition, rising fuel costs and new environmental regulations and hygiene standards complicate machine requirements.
“SKF has long provided agricultural solutions for all types of farming equipment, which strive to achieve high reliability at low ownership and operating costs. These offer farmers a simpler and more cost effective way to keep equipment such tillers, planters and harvesters working when they are most needed,” he says, adding that components are available for different equipment brands and SKF agricultural solutions, including new initiatives, will offer the same high quality and lower cost promise that runs across the entire SKF range.
While the Corona Virus pandemic continues to force lock-downs across the globe, the farming community needs to carry on producing the food the world needs. “While we will be working much more remotely, we will continue to strive to understand and support our customers’ needs and to develop safe ways of reacting to the new normal imposed on us by the pandemic,” Odendaal assures.
“We have a fantastic network and we can do a lot of our work remotely and online. Our modern condition monitoring systems, for example, enable us to remotely monitor customer equipment from safe offsite locations so that we can react quickly to emergencies.
“We know that there are some hard times ahead, but we are determined to emerge from them stronger and wiser,” he concludes.
