An Overview of Three-sided Way Covers

Today, most labor-intensive tasks across industries are automated. They are performed using various types of machines. Although these machines are designed for challenging environments some of these linear machines and guides cannot sustain contamination, high temperature, dirt, and dust. This is where protective way covers can work. These way covers are distinguished based on their designs. There are two types of way covers &#; bellows type way covers and telescopic type way covers. Of these, bellows type way covers are used to protect certain parts fully or partially. However, telescopic way covers are used to protect them fully. The way covers are generally distinguished by their design. Three-sided way covers are the most common types of way covers used across industries. What makes them unique? How are they built? This post discusses these way covers in detail and aims to answer many of the questions that you may have in mind regarding them.

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Three-Sided Way Covers Discussed in Detail

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These way covers are generally designed to protect the machine and industrial equipment from coolants, heavy loads, oils, dropped devices, and so on. Three-sided way covers offer versatility in terms of use and flexibility in design, which makes them popular. Here are some of their features and specifications.

• The three-sided way covers can be built using a wide range of materials including aluminized Kevlar, polyurethane, neoprene-coated nylon, polyurethane-coated polyester, and nylon, silicone fiberglass cloth, and polyurethane coated Nomex, and so on.
• The way covers are made from different types of processes such as RF welding, thermal welding, sewing and folding, and so on.
• Although their thicknesses may vary across manufacturers, way covers are generally offered in thicknesses ranging from 0.2mm to 1.7 mm.
• They can be made with single-layer or multi-layer fabric depending on the part to be protected.
• By changing the material combination and layers, these way covers can be easily customized for your application requirements.
• They are widely used across refinery and petrochemical, water and irrigation, food and beverage, medical and pharmaceutical, energy, aerospace and defense, and other industries.

Although you may be already familiar with way covers or even three-sided way covers, that is not enough. As they perform an important role in protecting your machine parts, it is important to invest in quality way covers. Nabell is an ISO : certified manufacturer of bellows covers in the US. The company provides way covers in different specifications to meet your application requirements. Their bellows meet different standards such as RoHS, REACH, COC, FAIR CONFLICT Minerals, and UL94 VTM-0. You can also approach the experts at the company for way cover repair services, which is exclusively handled by their Maintenance, Repair, and Operating (MRO) department.

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My reason for covering the ways is the most obvious reason. I hated making chips and having to constantly stop to wipe or remove the pile of chips that&#;s build up on the apron on chuck side. Then when you clean the cross slide and apron and chips fall all over the way. Then you gotta move the carriage to wipe the ways and not push any toward the carriage.
Now I don&#;t worry about any of that. I do occasionally lift the cover and check while giving the ways a nice bath of oil.
The best is I take a small paint brush and just run the pleats and all is clean. The material is like a rubbery plastic if that makes sense. Resist the oils and you&#;d have to get pretty hot to burn through the material.
This is the machine I pulled it off of which is a reel grinder. Throws sparks all day. I had to trim the cover to fit my application. The bellow is made of many plastic dividers let&#;s say. Then covered in the bellow material. The plastic dividers were cut to ride along the linear bearing rails originally. I had to cut off all the plastic underneath so the bellow was flat on the underside to slide on the ways of the lathe. I also cut the sides down so that it didn&#;t go over the leadscrew. My screw is already cover. The width of the cover is a touch over 11&#; and was 3&#; tall.


For my little 9x20 lathe I use a piece of rubber with a magnet at one end that sticks to carriage. Cover is about 6&#; long so it catches all the drops from the chuck and I just remove to clean off and reinstall. Works good but the accordion is better and protects more.