iglidur plain bearings make it easy to navigate the water on the ‘Solaris’ solar-powered speedboat.

Lubrication-free igus engineering plastics plain bearings for maintenance-free steering of solar-powered speedboats

A team of students in Wroclaw, Poland, is working on a vehicle of the future, the Solaris self-propelled speedboat, which is powered entirely by solar energy.

To make the boat easy to navigate on the water and maintenance-free, the young engineers are using igus plain bearings made from the high-performance engineering plastic iglidur J in the boat's steering system.

This makes the boat more stable, lighter and lubrication-free.

The need for cost-effective, efficient and environmentally friendly means of transport has become even greater than in the past.

That's why a team of students in Wroclaw, Poland, a city with hundreds of bridges, has developed a solar-powered speedboat.

The project, called Solaris I, is run by the PWR Solar Boat team and implemented under the auspices of the Faculty of Mechanical and Power Engineering.

For the sake of the environment, these young engineers are working towards the realisation of making the speedboat entirely powered by photovoltaic cells.

The project consists of three phases: development, manufacturing and implementation of the speedboat. An important part of the project is the digitalisation of the steering system of the speedboat.

This is similar to the teletype steering system used in aviation.

In addition, they needed to equip the system with plain bearings that did not need to be lubricated, were resistant to seawater, and were robust and easy to install.

In the end, they chose the iglidur plain bearings from igus.

Easy navigation on the water, no lubrication required

For the steering system of the speedboat, they use igus double-flanged bearings made of iglidur J high-performance engineering plastics.

‘This bearing not only has a long service life, but also reduces the weight of the entire system and is easy to install without lubrication.

‘ says Dominika Dewor of PWR Solar Fleet. Their project was supported by a sponsorship from the igus Support for Young Engineers programme (known as yes).

This igus programme aims to support school and university student projects by providing free igus samples, sponsorship and consultancy services.