Ruland bellows couplings – lightweight, low inertia, ideal for high rpm applications

Bellows couplings combine stainless steel bellows and aluminium hubs. The combination of aluminium hubs with the bellows results in an extremely lightweight, low inertia coupling. An important feature of the bellows coupling is a balanced design to reduce vibration in high rpm applications of up to 10,000 rpm.

The bellows are made of stainless steel, which makes them ideal for transmitting torque. Due to the bellows' uniform thin walls, the coupling is able to flex easily while remaining rigid under torsional loads, and provides low bearing loads that remain constant at all points of rotation. Parallel misalignment, angular misalignment and axial motion are accommodated by these couplings. Zero backlash and a long, maintenance-free life are assured since bellows couplings have no moving parts. These features collectively make bellows couplings an excellent choice in high end servo, stepper, encoder or positioning applications.

Ruland bellows couplings are offered in six sizes with set screw or Nomar clamp style hubs and straight or step bores ranging from 3mm to 25mm in the metric series and 1/8 to 1 in the inch series. All fasteners are metric. Stainless steel hubs, keyways, and other custom features are available by special order.

Bellows couplings are part of Ruland’s complete product line which also includes clamp style and quick clamping shaft collars and rigid couplings with precision honed bores, and five types of zero-backlash motion control couplings including beam couplings, oldham couplings, jaw couplings and miniature disc couplings.