Safety is #1 With GoatHead™  products. With the Multi Use Blades™ 

Featuring an Integrated guide plate, Internally captured blades with 5 points of contact with each cutting blade, external plates protecting the Inertially deployed cutting blades allow for the lightweight cutting blades to retract when encountering large or immovable objects resulting in Soft Shock™ absorbing cutting thereby reducing friction and energy loss to cutter and mechanical drives, This helps with hydraulic system protection even when equipped with dampening, load sensing electro hydraulic dampening, the lightweight balanced cutter lowers feedback and helps insure lower maintenance issues related to hydraulics (hoses, motors, actuators, pistons, mechanical gearing etc.) this provides for lower up and down line vibration, feedback, energy loss, mechanical stress, while also providing operator comfort and safety, safety for pedestrians, traffic, surrounding vegetation & structures along with less smashing and hammering to steel housing/deck around cutting blade, this is due to expanding circular saw effect. 

Multi Use Blades™   Feature Multiple light weight cutting blades around circumference of circular plates, when cutting blades are deployed they lock in and maintain an angled & radiused back approach, allowing lightweight & thinner serrated or sharpened Blade edges to slice through vegetation with ease. Expanding circular cutting blade, approach angles of blades are not crashing, hacking, smashing into vegetative objects at random angles like with a typical 2 blade un-balanced cutting blades, GoatHead™ cutters feature limited range of motion per blade (protecting balance of cutter) , locked in approach angles, cut debris has reduced friction to cutter because of angled blades & Soft Shock™ (lightweight blades absorb some of the friction by moving inward & away from resistance) 

Lighter Cutting blades reduce resistance along with balanced & sandwiched plates with an internal guide plate gives the GoatHead™  Cutter a fuel efficient balanced flywheel design (flywheel is a mechanical device specifically designed to efficiently store rotational energy or kinetic energy). allowing for less RPM's, lower fuel input, lower engine output requirements.

See Flywheel (A flywheel can be used to smooth energy fluctuations and make the energy flow intermittent operating machine more uniform. Flywheels are used in most combustion piston engines.

Energy is stored mechanically in a flywheel as kinetic energy.

Kinetic energy in a flywheel can be expressed as

Ef = 1/2 I ω2                              (1)
where
Ef = flywheel kinetic energy (Nm, Joule, ft lb)
I = moment of inertia (kg m2, lb ft2)
ω = angular velocity (rad/s)

• 1 rad = 360o / 2 π =~ 57.29578o
• 1 rad/s = 9.55 rev/min (rpm) = 0.159 rev/s (rps)

Moment of inertia quantifies the rotational inertia of a rigid body and can be expressed as

I = k m r2                                (2)
where
k = inertial constant - depends on the shape of the flywheel
m = mass of flywheel (kg, lbm)
r = radius (m, ft)

Inertial constants of some common types of flywheels

• wheel loaded at rim like a bicycle tire - k =1
• flat solid disk of uniform thickness - k = 0.606
• flat disk with center hole - k = ~0.3
• solid sphere - k = 2/5
• thin rim - k = 0.5
• radial rod - k = 1/3
• circular brush - k = 1/3
• thin-walled hollow sphere - k = 2/3
• thin rectangular rod - k = 1/2

• 1 kg m2 = 10000 kg cm2 = 54675 ounce in2 = 3417.2 lb in2 = 23.73 lb ft2

With better Fuel efficiency comes less emissions, Lower energy output, lower RPM's equals less fumes/emissions, The maintenance of the energy produced is increased with the use of lightweight quickly retracting blades that reduces resistance allowing for smooth and easy rotation of cutter (Soft Shock™) this translates into lower energy loss thereby Saving energy and fuel resulting in less fumes or emissions.

GoatHead™  Multi Use Blades™ utilize State of the art engineering allowing multiple lightweight Cutting blades spaced evenly & Balanced around protective guide plates to retract inside protective plates before excessive interference to cutting blades occur thereby reducing damage to cutting blades, and extending cutting blade life.

Reduced Vibration and Mechanical wear, Less Resistance & Friction, 

Jeremy Wright, Noria Corporation

Vibration analysis, when properly done, allows you to evaluate the health of equipment. By finding inherent failures before they become catastrophic, maintenance personnel can minimize unplanned downtime.

In simplest terms, vibration in motorized equipment is the back-and-forth movement, or oscillation, of machines and components, such as drive motors, driven devices (pumps, compressors and so on), and the bearings, shafts, gears, belts and other elements that make up mechanical systems.

Vibration in industrial equipment can be both a sign and a source of trouble. Other times, vibration just “goes with the territory” as a normal part of machine operation, and should not cause undue concern. This article focuses on those machines that are designed to operate with minimal vibration.

Most industrial devices are engineered to operate smoothly and avoid vibration, not produce it. In these machines, vibration can indicate problems or deterioration in the equipment. If the underlying causes are not corrected, the unwanted vibration itself can cause additional damage.

Vibration can result from a number of conditions, acting alone or in combination. Keep in mind that vibration problems may be caused by auxiliary equipment, not just the primary equipment. The following are some of the major causes of vibration.

Imbalance: A “heavy spot” in a rotating component will cause vibration when the unbalanced weight rotates around the machine’s axis, creating a centrifugal force. Imbalance could be caused by manufacturing defects (machining errors, casting flaws) or maintenance issues (deformed or dirty fan blades, missing balance weights). As machine speed increases, the effects of imbalance become greater. Imbalance can severely reduce bearing life as well as cause undue machine vibration.

Misalignment: Vibration can result when machine shafts are out of line. Angular misalignment occurs when, for example, the axes of a motor and pump are not parallel. When the axes are parallel but not exactly aligned, the condition is known as parallel misalignment. Misalignment may be caused during assembly or develop over time, due to thermal expansion, components shifting or improper reassembly after maintenance. The resulting vibration may be radial or axial (in line with the axis of the machine) or both.

Wear: As components such as ball or roller bearings, drive belts or gears become worn, they may cause vibration. When a roller bearing race becomes pitted, for instance, the bearing rollers will cause a vibration each time they travel over the damaged area. A gear tooth that is heavily chipped or worn, or a drive belt that is breaking down, also can produce vibration.

Looseness: Vibration that might otherwise go unnoticed may become obvious and destructive if the component that is vibrating has loose bearings or is loosely attached to its mounts. Such looseness may or may not be caused by the underlying vibration. Whatever its cause, looseness can allow any vibration present to cause damage, such as further bearing wear, wear and fatigue in equipment mounts and other components.

The effects of vibration can be severe. Unchecked machine vibration can accelerate rates of wear (i.e. reduce bearing life) and damage equipment. Vibrating machinery can create noise, cause safety problems and lead to degradation in plant working conditions. Vibration can cause machinery to consume excessive power and may damage product quality. In the worst cases, vibration can damage equipment so severely as to knock it out of service and halt plant production.

Yet there is a positive aspect to machine vibration. Measured and analyzed correctly, vibration can be used in a preventive maintenance program as an indicator of machine condition and help guide the plant maintenance professional to take remedial action before disaster strikes.

To understand how vibration manifests itself, consider a simple rotating machine like an electric motor. The motor and shaft rotate around the axis of the shaft, which is supported by a bearing at each end. One key consideration in analyzing vibration is the direction of the vibrating force. In our electric motor, vibration can occur as a force applied in a radial direction (outward from the shaft) or in an axial direction (parallel to the shaft). An imbalance in the motor, for instance, would most likely cause a radial vibration as the “heavy spot” in the motor rotates, creating a centrifugal force that tugs the motor outward as the shaft rotates through 360 degrees. A shaft misalignment could cause vibration in an axial direction (back and forth along the shaft axis) due to misalignment in a shaft coupling device.

Another key factor in vibration is amplitude, or how much force or severity is encompassed in the vibration. The farther out of balance our motor is, the greater its amplitude of vibration. Other factors, such as speed of rotation, also can affect vibration amplitude. As rotation rate goes up, the imbalance force increases significantly. Frequency refers to the oscillation rate of vibration, or how rapidly the machine tends to move back and forth under the force of the condition or conditions causing the vibration. Frequency is commonly expressed in cycles per minute or hertz (CPM or Hz). One Hz equals one cycle per second, or 60 cycles per minute.

Though we called our example motor “simple”, even this machine can exhibit a complex vibration signature. As it operates, it could be vibrating in multiple directions (radially and axially), with several rates of amplitude and frequency. Imbalance vibration, axial vibration, vibration from deteriorating roller bearings and more all could combine to create a complex vibration spectrum.

Vibration is a characteristic of virtually all industrial machines. When vibration increases beyond normal levels, it may indicate only normal wear – or it may signal the need for further assessment of the underlying causes or for immediate maintenance action. Understanding why vibration occurs and how it manifests itself is a key first step toward preventing vibration from causing trouble in the production environment.

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