stainless steel bearings

Specifiers of Lily stainless steel ball bearings have a choice of two stainless steel options, both providing excellent hardness characteristics and a high level of corrosion resistance.

AISI 440C

AISI 440 Stainless Steel - Which exhibit excellent toughness and hardness properties and offer good corrosion resistance. This material is used extensively in bearing applications where precise tolerances and surface finishes are required. Common heat treating may be in accordance with MIL-H-6875. Stainless steel bearings are availabe in a variety of stainless steel material grade and compositions. Benefits of AISI 440c stainless steel bearings include: Withstand tough, corrosive conditions for extended service life, reduced maintenance costs and equipment downtime. 

300 Series Stainless Steel (316 & 304)

In a semi-precision grade bearing, 300 series stainless steel can be chosen for improved corrosion resistance over 440C. These materials are not heat treated so load capacity is significantly less than HT 52100 & 440C. It can be used for both rings and balls or SS rings with ceramic balls. 300 series stainless steel offers excellent corrosion resistance to water and excellent to good resistance when exposed to certain common acids. This material can be an excellent choice for food grade applications. Other applications may include marine and vacuum processes. 300 series stainless steel is also a common material used for ribbon and crown type retainers. 300 series stainless steels are generally considered non-magnetic.

Lily stainless steel bearings bring unique capabilities for food processing and packaging, beverage, medical and marine equipment.  Lily engineers combine advanced bearing design expertise with broad industry knowledge to satisfy the toughest application requirements. 

Features and Benefits

Bearings manufactured from a variety of stainless steel materials 

Withstand tough, corrosive conditions for extended service life 

Reduced maintenance costs and equipment downtime

Application Examples

Poultry processing trolley. Stainless steel bearings and an engineered polymer pulley resist the harsh washdown environment found in poultry-processing plants. 

Bakery conveyor.  Lily stainless steel bearing designs withstand the heat in bread ovens, proofing ovens and commercial toaster ovens where temperatures can exceed 650 F. These designs extend the life and expensive maintenance of bakery conveyor chains. 

Bottling plant. This bearing solved a tough corrosion problem in a sports drink filling machine. High salt content and bottling at elevated temperatures created a processing environment that required excessive maintenance and frequent bearing replacement. 

Marine. Sea water exposure represents one of the most severe applications in the bearing world.  Lily utilized a special grade of stainless steel to meet the needs for a demanding shift detent application.

Medical. A  Lily stainless steel unitized thrust bearing replaced a three-piece design and solved a slippage problem due to bearing wear in biomedical diagnostics equipment. 

The most common stainless steel bearing type is ball bearing, in addition our stainless steel bearing also include angular contact ball bearing, tapered bearing, spherical bearing,pillow block bearing,flange bearing,thrust bearings,needle bearings ... 

Stainless Steel Ball Bearings vs. Other Types of Ball Bearings

There are no ball bearings without balls and races, but the type of parts you will find in a ball bearing with respect to the materials used will vary. All bearings must be made primarily of a very strong, rust-resistant substance like steel, but full stainless steel ball bearings are not the only kind you will encounter. Here are the different types of ball bearings you can expect to see.

High Carbon Chromium Steel Ball Bearings

These steel ball bearings are very strong and, when hardened, can bear heavy loads and provide long bearing life. They also have very good noise resistance characteristics for noise-sensitive applications. Because they do have some percentage of chromium, they are not quite as corrosion-resistant as stainless steel ball bearings; however, they are cost effective. With lubricated ball bearings, there is a good chance that corrosion will virtually never be an issue.

Ceramic Hybrid Ball Bearings

Although it can be quite expensive, some ball bearings use ceramic balls instead of steel balls because they are lighter, allowing the bearing to spin faster. They are called hybrid ball bearings because the inner and outer rings are made of steel even though the balls are ceramic, so they are a hybrid of ceramic and steel.

Stainless Steel Ball Bearings

Lily stainless steel ball bearings means in addition to hardness, load capacity, and bearing life that is competitive with other types of ball bearing stainless steel, Lily stainless steel has noise characteristics that are competitive with high carbon chromium. 

More on Ball Bearing Materials

If you want the most complete protection from corrosion that we can offer for your ball bearings, we recommends the stainless steel ball bearings. If your ball bearings are consistently lubricated or you are not particularly concerned about corrosion due to the nature of your applications, you may wish to work with the high carbon chromium steel ball bearings. If you're not quite sure which ball bearing materials are right for you and your applications, you can contact us about obtaining some samples so that you can see the different types of ball bearings up close. No matter what ball bearings you order, you'll be getting some of the highest quality, most expertly designed ball bearings in the industry, bearings designed to handle whatever kind of loads your application requires and to provide long life and low noise and vibration for those noise-sensitive applications.