First I would like to ask you where you're catching the sample from. If its from the drain port, you are highly likely to see some iron content.

But 120 ppm seems extremely high, you might want to inspect the gears at next opportunity. Any vibration data taken on this unit?

Hi,

I am taking sample from the dipstick with a drop tube/suction pump. I am careful not to touch bottom of gearbox reservoir when I take the sample, while the gearbox is running. I am seeing 166ppm iron on ICP spectro and 176ppm magnetic iron count on one particular gearbox. 

As previously noted this is a baseline oil sample, which seems to me to raise flags due to the high iron count. This gearbox only holds 5.9 litres of oil. I have attached the ISO /opc count. Thee also seems to high.  I have done a baseline vibration reading on this gearbox approximately 2 months ago. I don't have access to the data right now as I am away from site. But I will be reviewing it as soon as I return to work in 2 days time.

I have mentioned that am not familar with this cyclo style gearbox and was looking for some feedback to whether or not high iron counts do occur in these units.

But the fact remains the same that high iron counts like this will damage bearings and gears.

Thanks for your feedback.

Here is the ISO/OPC counts.It wouldn't attach.

25/23/18 

Optical Particle Classification >20 micron 

cutting 69 #/ml

sliding 115 #/ml

Fatigue 335 #/ml

Realizing that this is a pretty old thread, but was there ever resolution to this?  I'm seeing similar levels of wear on our Cyclo.

Hi Jason,

The elevated iron levels on all 5 of our cyclo gear units after 2.5 years running have somewhat stabilized around 50 ppm using spectro, and we are also checking the total magnetic content every sample. We haven't had any failures yet (knock on wood). We are changing oil whenever the level on the spectro results go close or over 100 ppm.  Vibration readings are taken regularly, and no considerable increase from baseline measurements from 2 years ago. However, one of the 5 units show a more unique pattern in the spectra data.

Thanks for the response Greg.

We're at 25/23/15 with 12 cutting, 0 sliding, 139 fatigue, so we may be a ways off yet.  It's also a somewhat unfamiliar gearbox for us, so we're not sure what to expect yet.  I'm still trying to nail down whether our sample was taken while running and if it was just a pour out of the drain fitting.  It's a non-critical conveyor drive of ours, and we've got a center bearing stocked, so even if it breaks down, we could likely be up and running in a day, but I'm trying to educate myself on what the normals are for this style of gearbox.