Needle roller bearings

When a shaft leaves no room for a standard ball or roller bearing, a needle roller bearing is usually the answer. Its rollers are long and slim, so it carries heavy radial loads inside a very thin cross section. You will find them in gearboxes, pumps, compressors, power tools, transmissions, production machinery and automation equipment. The range covers drawn cup designs, bearings with machined rings (with or without an inner ring) and thrust assemblies.

Drawn cup part numbers carry the dimensions. Take HK 0408 (SKF) and HK4516 (NTN): the first pair of digits is the shaft diameter in millimeters and the second pair is the width, so a 4 mm shaft by 8 wide in one case and 45 by 16 in the other. The leading letters tell you the construction. HK is an open-ended drawn cup, while BK, as in BK 1212 and BK4516, has one end closed. A TN suffix, as in HK 0306 TN, points to a polyamide cage. INA's AS series, with AS0414 and AS0515, covers the thrust washers used in axial assemblies.

The first selection question is whether your shaft can serve as the raceway. Drawn cup bearings and designs without an inner ring need a hardened, ground shaft with a good surface finish; if yours falls short, add an inner ring. Also review load, lubrication and the housing bore tolerance, since a drawn cup is pressed in and takes on the shape of its seat. Needle rollers cannot carry thrust, so axial loads call for separate thrust components.

Brands we carry in this line: NSK, INA, NTN, SKF and McGill. For a quote, send the full part number, such as HK 0408 or HMK4030, or give us the shaft diameter, outside diameter and width. A sample part or another brand's part number also helps us pin it down. Send your request by WhatsApp or email and we'll get back to you promptly.