Cracking reason of bearing cage

Cage in the rolling bearing plays an equal distance to isolate the rolling element and prevent the rolling element from falling, guide and drive the rolling element to rotate.
Although the bearing is composed of many parts, the first damaged (failure) part of the bearing is often the cage. The cage can be said to be the "blood vessel" of the bearing. It can evenly and orderly distribute the inner ring, outer ring and rolling element. If there is a slight error, it is easy to shorten the service life of the bearing, or even damage it. So what is the cause of bearing cage fragmentation?
The causes of bearing cage damage are as follows:
1. Insufficient lubrication of bearings. If the lubricating oil or grease is dried up and not added in time (maintenance), the label of the lubricating oil or grease is wrong.
2. The impact load of the bearing. The intense vibration in the impact load produces the impact of the rolling element on the cage.
3. Cleanliness of bearings. The seal of the bearing in the bearing box is not good, there is dust entering, and the friction between the rolling element and the cage is added, so that the cage is damaged.
4. Installation issues. If the bearing is not installed correctly, the cage will be damaged during installation.
5. Bearing creep phenomenon. Creep mostly refers to the sliding phenomenon of the ring. When the interference of the mating surface is insufficient, the load point moves to the surrounding direction due to the sliding, resulting in the deviation of the ring relative to the axis or shell in the circumferential direction.
6. Abnormal load of bearing cage. It is easy to reduce the clearance, increase the friction heat generation, soften the surface, and cause abnormal spalling too early. With the expansion of spalling, the spalling foreign matters enter the cage pocket, resulting in the cage operation block and additional load, which aggravates the wear of the cage. Such deterioration of the cycle effect may cause the cage fracture.
7. Material defect of bearing cage. Cracks, large non-metallic inclusions, shrinkage cavity, bubble and riveting defects, lack of rivets, spacer or gap between two half cages, serious riveting damage, etc. may cause cage fracture.
8. The penetration of hard foreign matter in bearing. The invasion of foreign hard foreign bodies or other impurities aggravates the wear of cage. In view of the above reasons, the bearing life will be very long. Many of the causes of bearing damage are not due to the bearing life, but due to the external environment, such as insufficient lubrication, dust entry, wrong installation, excessive load, high temperature, and improper coupling.
9. Other reasons. If the coupling is misaligned, the bearing will be skewed and the force will be uneven; The belt is installed too tightly; Environmental problems and so on can damage the bearing or cage.
In view of the above reasons, the bearing life will be very long. However, suggestions: the cause of bearing cage damage has to be analyzed in detail, depending on what type of bearing you are using, what kind of equipment you are installed on, and how the working condition is, etc.