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How Adaptor Plates, Spacers And Cotton Reel Adaptors Are Used.

Adaptor Plates, Spacers, Cotton Reels

Adaptor plates, spacers and cotton reel adaptors are all products proudly designed and manufactured by the team at Poly Flex. All these products are custom-made to order, meeting the customers’ requirements precisely. There are many reasons why customers utilise custom-made adaptor plates, spacers, or cotton reel adaptors to achieve solutions that can’t be achieved by sourcing an off-the-shelf item.

Adaptor Plates

Commonly used when customers acquire a new engine/gearbox setup and want to utilise the pre-existing shaft coupling arrangement. An adaptor plate often uses the gearbox flange orientation on one side using bolts, spring washers, and hex nuts to connect it and the shaft coupling flange orientation on the other side connected via bolts threaded into the adaptor plate, allowing two different flange patterns to mate. Adaptor plates are also used where a flexible coupling is unachievable due to the flange pattern having too many holes or the torque rating being too powerful for the standard flexible coupling to handle.

Steel Coupling Spacers

Use to make up room in the drive train where the shaft cannot be moved or to push the shaft further out. This can be due to needing to cut the shaft slightly shorter because a shaft coupling is seized to the shaft or because a customer wants to install a rope cutter and needs more shaft exposed outside the hull. They are also commonly used in alignment procedures as a flexible coupling cannot be used during this because it is a soft element.

Cotton Reel Adaptors

Work like adaptor plates and spacers but are manufactured to take up a larger gap than a standard spacer or adaptor plate will allow. They can vary in length and size and, therefore, are custom-manufactured to order to suit the customer’s application. Cotton reel adaptors can have the same flange dimensions on either side, acting like a spacer, or different flange dimensions, working like an adaptor plate.

A custom cotton reel adaptor, 524 to 616 5/8” – 170mm face to face.

Poly Flex proudly designs, manufactures, and dispatches these custom products worldwide.

With our state-of-the-art CNC machinery, Poly Flex can modify our entire standard range to suit a customer’s application. Contact the team today for more information regarding our custom manufacturing and how we can help find your solution.