Rolling contact bearing arrangement for rollers in continuous casting plants

Abstract

A rolling contact bearing arrangement for two axially adjacent rollers, e.g. for use in a continuous casting plant. The rollers are each mounted via two rolling contact bearings, wherein the two central adjacent rolling contact bearings are arranged within the hollows at the inner ends of the rollers. The rotating bearing outer ring bearing the roller and the stationary bearing inner ring being supported by a common axle journal for both bearings, which is held in a supporting block. This arrangement enables the distance between two axially adjacent rollers to be minimized and the cast material or slab may sag less at this point.

What is claimed is:  
     
         1 . A rolling contact bearing arrangement for two axially adjacent rollers, comprising: 
 each roller has a respective outward end opposite and away from the adjacent roller and each outward end is supported for rotation, each roller has an inward end toward the inward end of the adjacent roller, the adjacent rollers being hollow at least toward their inward ends;    a respective rolling contact bearing located in each of the hollows in the inner ends of the adjacent rollers, each contact bearing having an outer ring bearing the respective roller and rotating therewith, and each bearing having an inner ring inward of the outer ring, and bearing elements between the inner and outer rings allowing for relative rotation;    a common axle journal disposed inside and supporting both of the inner rings of the adjacent rollers.    
     
     
         2 . The bearing arrangement of  claim 1 , further comprising a supporting block supporting the common axle journal.  
     
     
         3 . The bearing arrangement of  claim 1 , wherein each of the contact bearings is near the axially inward end of the respective rollers.  
     
     
         4 . A rolling contact bearing arrangement for a continuous casting plant, comprising: 
 a plurality of sets of two axially adjacent rollers, each set of axially adjacent rollers being spaced apart from adjacent sets of the rollers in a radial direction and the roller sets being adapted to support a slab being cast;    each of the sets of axially adjacent rollers includes two axially adjacent rollers and a respective rolling contact bearing arrangement according to  claim 1  for the two axially adjacent rollers.    
     
     
         5 . The bearing arrangement of  claim 1 , wherein the rollers have an outer surface and a cooling device at the outer surface of the roller.  
     
     
         6 . The bearing arrangement of  claim 5 , wherein the cooling device comprises a first helical, thread-like cooling duct for in feed of coolant and a second thread-like cooling duct for discharge of coolant, and the ducts being arranged parallel to each other, and the first duct being connected to the second duct to define a flow circuit of coolant.  
     
     
         7 . The bearing arrangement of  claim 6 , wherein the first duct is connected for in feed and the second duct is connected for discharge of coolant at the outer end of the rollers and the first and second ducts are connected to each other toward the inner ends of the rollers, so that cooling medium can flow from the first duct into the second cooling duct and along the axially length of each of the rollers.  
     
     
         8 . The bearing arrangement of  claim 7 , wherein the rollers have outer shells and the cooling ducts are radially inside the outer shells thereof.