hopper vibrator

The Engineering Perspective: How to Stop Fatigue Failure During Vibrator Installation

By Derek Stake

Mar 18

After reading some of our very informative blogs about vibration applications on hoppers, you probably learned that vibrators don’t damage equipment, wrong installations do. Those blogs described how critical it is to size the vibrator for your hopper applications and the importance of using a stitch weld to adhere the vibrator mount to the hopper wall. Now, I would like to provide some engineering support discussing why stitch welding is essential and further insight into how vibration works to improve material flow inside a hopper.

Derek Stake

Joining The Cleveland Vibrator Company in February 2019, Derek Stake is now the Director of Engineering & Operations. As a Cleveland State University graduate, Derek provides extensive knowledge with a BA of Physics, BS of Mechanical Engineering, and MS of Mechanical Engineering. This CrossFit enthusiast offers years of engineering and operations expertise from his experience as Operations Manager at a local forging company. When not immersed in the world of vibration, you can find this Cleveland sports fan doing yard work and spending time with his wife and two kids!

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Which Industrial Vibrator Works Best for Cold Temperature Applications?

Which Industrial Vibrator Works Best for Cold Temperature Applications?

By CVC Team

Aug 12

Previously, I wrote a blog about industrial vibrator options for hot temperature applications like transfer chutes in forging facilities or installations on cope & drags in a foundry. But what about those applications on the other end of the temperature spectrum?

Let’s talk about those cold environment applications like outdoor installs on a silo, chute, or load-out spout in geographic locations that face frigid temps, hopper bottom trailers delivering goods when there’s snow on the ground, or within facilities that do not have climate control.

When frigid temps are a factor, we lean towards supplying an electric vibrator option for material flow issues. Electric industrial vibrators do not require compressed airlines to operate, which is the biggest drawback when using pneumatic vibrators for these application environments.

Between RE Rotary Electric Vibrators, CM Electromagnetic Vibrators, and DC Vibrators, plenty of voltage options, force outputs, and frequencies are available.

Having Material Flow Problems?  Your Liner Could Be to Blame.

By Steve Chinn

May 19

Material flow problems are time-consuming, messy, expensive, and can even contribute to workplace hazards. The tricky part? Many problems can slow down your production processes, such as applying the wrong vibration force and frequency for the application, issues with the installation of the vibratory flow aid, and even the size and style of the liner applied to the inside of your bin, hopper, chute, or pipe.

That was the case with a customer who wanted to apply vibration to their ¼” thick wall chutes for sand processing. Previously, they manually cleaned their chutes with a garden hoe leading to unnecessary employee injuries, equipment damage, and production downtime. Knowing they have liners installed, we asked three important questions:

Steve Chinn

Joining The Cleveland Vibrator Company team as Sales Lead in January of 2017, Steve Chinn offers extensive knowledge and experience in the Bulk Material Handling industry. As a Cleveland State University graduate with a major in Communication and a minor in Marketing, Steve works closely with Uras Techno, the manufacturer of the high-quality Rotary Electric Motor product line exclusively distributed by The Cleveland Vibrator Company.

When not *almost* losing in our company Fantasy Football league, you can find this Cleveland sports fan golfing or spending time with his wife and two kids. He even coaches his kid’s baseball teams!

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How Hoppers Can Improve Performance of Feeders & Screeners

By Jack Steinbuch

Jul 28

Hoppers can aid in the performance of material handling equipment, plus provide health and safety benefits for your workforce. To begin, we will review the advantages hoppers can provide to improve the performance of feeders and screeners for bulk loading applications.

RFM electromechanical hopper feeder Side loading — Hopper

Okay, so what is a hopper?

Hoppers can be stationary with steeply sloping walls to allow free-flowing material to discharge onto the feed tray. Due to their steep walls, these hoppers can have a high dump height, depending on the volume. For lower dump heights and/or poor flowing materials, a vibrating hopper is a great solution. The hopper is attached to the vibrating body and the vibrators are then upsized to compensate for the increase in vibrating weight. The material is fed from the hopper onto the equipment.

Jack Steinbuch

Jack Steinbuch has been with The Cleveland Vibrator Company for over 36 years accumulatively. He has previous experience in the manufacturing industry as a Senior Application Engineer and has worn many hats on our team in sales and managerial capacities. Now, he’s in the position of General Sales Manager. With a BSCE from The University of Toledo, he is an expert in the realm of sizing vibratory screeners and feeders, and sizing vibratory drives for tables and other vibratory equipment. Understanding that customer service is crucial, Jack believes it is important to provide the proper product for every application, even if it happens to not be supplied by The Cleveland Vibrator Company.

In his off-hours, you can find Jack spending time with his family and playing with his grandchildren. He loves sports; both watching and playing, and is an avid golfer and a league bowler during the winter. He will be retiring at the end of September 2021 and hopes to spend his winters vacationing in Florida.

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Automate the Hammer Swing by Following These 5 Steps

By Cleveland Vibrator Team

Jul 08

Our team is frequently asked about the proper installation of our Single Impact Air Knocker units. Since these units require two strokes of air for proper operation, the required components and installation process are slightly different than a more traditional pneumatic piston vibrator. Here, we will answer frequently asked questions and walk through the step-by-step installation process.

Step One

After properly sizing and selecting the units (which can easily be completed by utilizing our Vibrator Selection Guide!), it is time to install. First order of business, what are the components required for proper operation? There are a few items needed:

The Single Impact Air Knocker (Complete with the Exhaust Port Protector and Grade 5 mounting hardware, provided with each unit)
The Mounting Channel
Hoses
Valve
Filter/Regulator/Lubricator
Safety Cable
Timer Box (Optional)

Truck & Trailer Loads Demand A Tough Solution – What Are Your Vibratory Options?

By Mike Stratis

Jun 06

When it comes to unloading dry or semi-dry bulk materials from a hopper trailer, belly dump, side dump, end dump, or similar type of truck, a few vibratory options are available to the market. Depending on the power supply available on the mobile equipment, air or electric, the vibratory components change. We will first look at the air-powered vibrator options then turn to the electric-powered vibrator options.

Air Powered Options

Piston Style Vibrator

The pneumatic or air-powered units that are available are the piston-style vibrator or the turbine-style vibrator. These two are by far the most common air-powered vibrators found on mobile equipment. The Vibra-Might Air Piston Vibrators are popular units in the field because these vibrators have a dual-diameter piston that allows for start-up at any mounting angle, and there is no spring on the inside of the vibrator. No spring = less wear parts.

These vibrators also have a single exhaust port and come standard with the exhaust port protector. The exhaust port protector helps keep dust, dirt, water, and other contaminants out of the bore of the vibrator. These Vibra-Might air piston vibrators come in both 4-bolt square base and 2-bolt rectangular base designs. The 2-bolt design is more common, and the slotted bolt holes of the 1200 VMR (impacting piston) or 1200 VMRAC (non-impacting piston) cover a wide range of new or existing bolt patterns. Also, if there is no oiler or lubricator on the truck itself, we offer coated casted bodies that can operate with or without lubricant. Adding lubricant will help the longevity of the vibrator, but it is not necessary.

Mike Stratis

Mike joined The Cleveland Vibrator Company team in 2013 with prior experience in manufacturing sales with a Cleveland company in the tool and die industry. Now, he’s the Director of Sales and specializes in “making stuff that shakes stuff”.

When he’s not immersed in the world of industrial vibration, as rare as that might be, Mike keeps busy *not finishing in last place* in Fantasy Football and enjoys spending time with his wife and three kids. It’s always golf season for Mike, and he’s been known to 3 putt his way around any course and can roll tee balls in rain or shine. You can find him tailgating in the Muni Lot before Browns games or supporting local breweries.

As an avid provider of #VibrationEducation, he offers this free bit of advice, “Not all vibration is the same. Force and frequency do matter!” However, there is a 2% upcharge for all Michigan and Steeler’s fans.

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The Importance of Proper Installation of Industrial Vibrators

The Importance of Proper Installation of Industrial Vibrators

By Mike Stratis

Apr 13

“If you don’t have the time to do it right, when will you have the time to do it again?”
– John Wooden, former UCLA Men’s Basketball Coach and Presidential Medal of Freedom award winner.

We have a few frequently asked questions regarding bin vibrators, many of which revolve around how to install the unit. Here is the down and dirty:

Mike Stratis

Mike joined The Cleveland Vibrator Company team in 2013 with prior experience in manufacturing sales with a Cleveland company in the tool and die industry. Now, he’s the Director of Sales and specializes in “making stuff that shakes stuff”.

When he’s not immersed in the world of industrial vibration, as rare as that might be, Mike keeps busy *not finishing in last place* in Fantasy Football and enjoys spending time with his wife and three kids. It’s always golf season for Mike, and he’s been known to 3 putt his way around any course and can roll tee balls in rain or shine. You can find him tailgating in the Muni Lot before Browns games or supporting local breweries.

As an avid provider of #VibrationEducation, he offers this free bit of advice, “Not all vibration is the same. Force and frequency do matter!” However, there is a 2% upcharge for all Michigan and Steeler’s fans.

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Vibrator Testing and Data Collection – The Story Continues…

Vibrator Testing and Data Collection – The Story Continues…

By CVC Team

Mar 10

I’m not sure but I think it was the really old Batman and Robin series with Adam West where the show would end with the dynamic duo in sort of real trouble. Some place along the line they’d pick up the story with a line something like “when last we checked in with…” well that sort of applies to my efforts to collect new data on Cleveland Vibrator’s line of pneumatic piston vibrators, both impact and air cushioned. Well…when last we check in… Cleveland Vibrator was making efforts to better document the performance of the piston vibrator line and we’d just recently purchased a CoCo-80 Dynamic Signal Analyzer as part of that effort. I’d Blogged about my efforts and initial results a while back.

The initial plan was to capture the acceleration of a heavy plate to which we bolt an impact vibrator or air cushioned piston vibrator and isolate the plate with very soft airmounts. Then using the equation F=ma, we’d calculate the force output of the vibrator, it all seemed reasonable. At the time I wrote about data collected on the VM-25, miniature piston vibrator. Read More…
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Vibratory Sizing: Rocky Balboa Inspiration & Railcar Vibrators

Vibratory Sizing: Rocky Balboa Inspiration & Railcar Vibrators

By CVC Team

Nov 17

Railcar unloading can be a difficult task depending contributing factors such as the type of material, size, moisture content, if the material is frozen, or if it was compacted during shipment, just to name a few. Add to the fact the weather could change from transportation to delivery point, this creates an interesting sizing situation. At Cleveland Vibrator, we use our 1350 VMRR Vibrator as the “one size fits all” unit for rail car unloading. We realize that at times, our valued customers may require a vibrator or vibrators with a little more or less force and may even require a unit that operates at a lower noise level. Cleveland Vibrator understands our customer needs may have changed from what was used ten, twenty or thirty years ago. Tried and true methods of that era may need to be changed to accommodate new rail car designs.

In the past, most rail cars were steel and fitted with dove tailed female brackets either at the factory or in the field to accept the male wedge type railcar vibrators. This is still one of the preferred way to vibrate material out of rail cars even today. Read More…
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When A Vibratory Set Up Duplicates the Sledgehammer Motion of Five Workers at the Same Time…

When A Vibratory Set Up Duplicates the Sledgehammer Motion of Five Workers at the Same Time…

By CVC Team

Oct 27

I have said for years to my “better half”, you can never have enough “toys” especially as it pertains to tools and for sure in my case golf clubs. This can be said about a recent spray dryer hopper application. We normally mount one industrial vibrator to the side of a hopper or bin and sometimes two by placing the second vibrator 180 degrees apart from the first vibrator installation area. In rare cases, we will actually mount three vibrators 120 degrees apart. The spray dryer customer wanted to mount five of our 1125 SI Single Impact Air Knockers on one hopper to dislodge sticky material. Not only did they want to mount five vibrators, but they also wanted them to impact at the same time. So, the folks of Cleveland Vibrator got creative. Read More…
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Okay, so what is a hopper?

Air Powered Options

Piston Style Vibrator

Solutions in Motion!

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