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Philip Vaughan was a Welsh inventor and ironmaster who patented the first design for a ball bearing in 1794. [1] [2] Vaughan's patent [3] described how iron balls could be placed between the wheel and the axle of a carriage. The balls let the carriage wheels rotate freely by reducing friction. [4]
Although bearings had been developed since ancient times, the first modern recorded patent on ball bearings was awarded to Philip Vaughan, a Welsh inventor and ironmaster who created the first design for a ball bearing in Carmarthen in 1794. His was the first modern ball-bearing design, with the ball running along a groove in the axle assembly. [1]
This may be provided with sharp, hardened knife edges, adjusted to be both horizontal and parallel. Alternatively, a pair of free-running ball bearing races is substituted for each knife edge, which relaxed the horizontal and parallel requirement. The object is either axially symmetrical like a wheel or must be provided with an axle.
Fischer designed the ball grinding mill, a machine that allows steel balls to be ground to an absolutely round state in large volumes for the first time. His innovation was to tilt slightly the grinding wheel by 1.9°, forcing the balls to rotate on both their axis while they are ground. [ 1 ]
A ball bearing. A bearing is a machine element that constrains relative motion to only the desired motion and reduces friction between moving parts.The design of the bearing may, for example, provide for free linear movement of the moving part or for free rotation around a fixed axis; or, it may prevent a motion by controlling the vectors of normal forces that bear on the moving parts.
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In the case of ball bearings, the bearing has inner and outer races and a set of balls. Each race is a ring with a groove where the balls rest. The groove is usually shaped so the ball is a slightly loose fit in the groove. Thus, in principle, the ball contacts each race at a single point.
A bearing can last indefinitely—longer than the rest of the machine—if it is kept cool, clean, lubricated, is run within the rated load, and if the bearing materials are sufficiently free of microscopic defects. Cooling, lubrication, and sealing are thus important parts of the bearing design.