Non sparking belt guard
Non sparking belt guard
(OP)
I have been asked to provide a non sparking belt guard. Someone told me to make it out of Aluminium. Do I need to use Aluminium fasteners on the guard as well? I worry Aluminium is too soft to hold things together. Can I use regular steel fasteners? Thanks.





RE: Non sparking belt guard
"Non-sparking" is a common term used in underground mining - which means anything that can produce a spark of sufficient intensity to ignite gas is forbidden underground - this include aluminium. So if it's an underground application - aluminium can not be used.
Naresuan University
Phitsanulok
Thailand
RE: Non sparking belt guard
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I don't suffer from insanity. I enjoy it...
RE: Non sparking belt guard
Brass and bronze are suitable no-sparking materials, so I would recommend brass, since this is readily available as sheet metal. Also it has the advantage above polymers that it can handle better external load when you chose sufficient wall thickness, depending upon the size of the guard. In customer spec's I see usually 100 kgs as external load to withstand. Hope this helps, regards, ct140
RE: Non sparking belt guard
I would be more worried about the non-sparking of the belt itself.
RE: Non sparking belt guard
Check some of the Stainless Steel alloys - that will give you strength and corrosion resistance
Timing has an awful lot to do with the outcome of a rain dance.
RE: Non sparking belt guard
RE: Non sparking belt guard
Naresuan University
Phitsanulok
Thailand
RE: Non sparking belt guard
But I think more explanation is needed as so many things are made of aluminum and are claimed to be non-sparking. Often when I get bids from vendors for equipment in hazardous areas they have specified aluminum coupling guards as non-sparking (I have never accepted them because aluminum is not allowed in the plants I work on for other reasons). Certainly if you bang two pieces of aluminum together, you will be there all week trying to make a spark. If you bang aluminum to a piece of rusty carbon steel, perhaps you will get a spark from some sort of chemical reaction, I can't be sure. But then, I can't confirm that if you bang brass on every known material you won't create a spark from any of them either.
Tim
RE: Non sparking belt guard
Aluminium is actually a very reactive metal. This should be apparent from its placing in the Periodic Table. The property of aluminium which disguises this reactive nature is the highly tenacious and very thin layer of aluminium oxide which forms almost immediately when raw aluminium is exposed to the atmosphere.
Mechanical damage from, say, contact with a rotating iron drive pulley would expose fresh aluminium in its reactive state. Add a little iron oxide in the form of rust and some frictional heating and you have the makings of the thermite process, a highly exothermic reaction between iron oxide and aluminium which results in pure iron and aluminium oxide as an end product. It is often used as the heat source to weld joints in rail tracks.
Many non-sparking tools are made from one of the bronze alloys, ironically often one bearing aluminium, or a beryllium copper alloy, both of which have good strength and low sparking capability.
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I don't suffer from insanity. I enjoy it...
RE: Non sparking belt guard
Naresuan University
Phitsanulok
Thailand
RE: Non sparking belt guard
RE: Non sparking belt guard
RE: Non sparking belt guard
Thanks!
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I don't suffer from insanity. I enjoy it...
RE: Non sparking belt guard
Naresuan University
Phitsanulok
Thailand