Gear reducers move conveyors efficiently

Woods Fabrication, Inc. uses concentric and right-angle gear reducers on its conveyors to improve efficiency and minimize breakdowns.

Jack Mans, Plant Operations Editor -- Packaging Digest, 6/1/2007

Gear motors with C-face designs give Woods ultimate flexibility in applying special motors to match its customer's requirements.

Within the fast-paced and demanding world of the commercial baking industry, Woods Fabrication, Inc. (www.woodsfab.com), Taylorsville, GA, is recognized for its quality, craftsmanship and reliability. The company supplies innovative solutions to many unique challenges in the baking market. The Woods Fabrication reputation for excellence results from more than 18 years of supplying reliable, custom conveyors and cooling tunnels to leading manufacturers of baked goods, including Flowers Snack, Kraft Foods, Nabisco, Kellogg and many others.

More than 10 years ago, Woods Fabrication began to specify speed reducers and gear motors from Sumitomo Drive Technologies (www.sumitomodrive.com) to drive its products, and it currently installs more than 200 reducers per year on its equipment, according to Woods' chief engineer Nevin Harne. Woods needed a drive that would enhance its product quality and reliability, explains Harne, and Sumitomo was initially chosen by owner Ricky Woods based on the excellent quality and performance of its Cyclo(R) concentric product. "The Sumitomo gear reducers are very efficient and require practically no maintenance," says Harne. "We supply them as standard on all of our conveyors and tunnels unless a customer specifically requests a gear motor from someone else." As Woods expanded into new applications, it began to use Sumitomo Hyponic(R) right-angle, shaft-mounted drives. Sumitomo supplies both Cyclo and Hyponic products in a C-face design to give Woods ultimate flexibility in applying special motors to match its customer's requirements.

They give us great service and their gear reducers seem to run forever, so there is no reason to consider anyone else.

"Sumitomo gives us great service," says Harne. "We get a lot of quick- turnaround orders, and on a few occasions, Sumitomo has been able to get reducers on their way to us within a day. And their gear reducers seem to run forever. We include a list of replacement parts with every conveyor we deliver, in case a customer needs spare parts, and I seldom remember when anyone ordered a replacement reducer due to failure."