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heating a bearing in the microwave

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hermetic:
I find this all a bit odd, I have fitted literally thousands of bearings, in nearly forty years in engineering, and have never heated a bearing in my life! Not saying you shouldn't do it, but you certainly couldn't do it with the modern "sealed for life" bearings, it would melt the grease out. I would just cool the shaft in a freezer if you could get it in, or press fit the bearing on a press. If the shaft is machined to the correct interference size, there shouldn't be a problem.
You can fit a bearing quite safely with a hammer, but you dont "beat the heck out of it" you use a peice of tube that matches the diameter of the inner race, and tap it on with a 2lb hammer.

Angus, the most common problem which scraps a dishwasher is the water softener (where you put the salt in) reaches the end of its life. Ask at your local independant appliance retailer, as they have to take them in for recycling, and the "big boys" like Curry's etc won't like breaking company policy to give you an old one. It would keep you out of trouble with the wife too!
Phil.UK

dawesy:
Angus I actually asked swmbo if I could put my cylinder head in ours a while ago. Didn't get an answer just 'the look'

steampunkpete:

--- Quote ---you certainly couldn't do it with the modern "sealed for life" bearings,
--- End quote ---

I think that Phil is right here, and it's what I was getting at in my first post. Depending on the spec and design of the bearing it could be degraded in some life-shortening way. A particular issue might be partial drying out of the cloth leading to hot spots or total drying out and over cooking.

There might be some configurations where it might be tempting to heat a rolling element bearing (if the right tools were not available for example), but I would always fit mechanically wherever possible.

mechman48:
I would steer clear of Microwaves & metal components   :zap:  IIRC when I used to fit bearings in industry we used a heated oil bath in the early days, with a thermometer, (not pre-sealed for life bearings ), then when the induction heaters came out it was easy peasy, set your bearing (only open rolling elements type ) on the bar on the two poles set the temp..(120*C iirc   :scratch: ) then wait for the buzzer / bell to go off.. but you had to be quick... & wear heat resisting gloves..  :bugeye:  but if the shaft clearances were correct then it was usually fitted with a press, or tube on the inner race assisted by a potential to kinetic energy converter of 2lb mass...  :lol:    If SWMBO has a used mini oven /grill going... go for it. Just remember as that 'most' of todays smaller bearings are 'sealed for life' application of heat in any form certainly wouldn't help..  :palm:

George.

AdeV:

--- Quote from: vtsteam on February 12, 2015, 11:52:40 AM ---Good for tempering, too. Set the thermostat for somewhat less than your tempering temp in case it's not accurate (likely). Check your part for color as you get close, and/or use an infrared thermometer. Adjust thermostat, as required to get what you want, and plunge when there. It's a nce even and slow process -- less danger of overshooting.

--- End quote ---

I use an ancient toaster oven (it came with an old tour bus I bought to haul the racing car around in). As the thermostat is very hit & miss, and i like to do reflow soldering in it, which doesn't like being massively over-temperature, I just added a cheap(ish) thermocouple, built a little arduino based device which reads the temperature out on some LED digits. Works great! If anyone's interested, I'll do a write up & costing.

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