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Finite element analysis (FEA) computer programs have been available for engineers' use as a design tool for more than two decades. They were adopted by the radial lip seal industry a decade ago. Now, FEA is a necessary tool because it has proven its capabilities in the seal industry, and seal customers are requiring it as a design verification instrument. This paper gives a brief description of the three phases that the engineer undergoes to perform FEA on a design: modeling, solving, and interpreting. Also, it discusses six studies that used FEA on sealing products for design verification, trouble shooting, and optimization. These few examples demonstrate how finite element analyses are used as a design tool in the radial lip seal industry.

Contamination of sealed systems from the outside not only affects the performance and life of a sealed mechanism, but also that of the seal itself. Many dust and dirt exclusion systems have been offered by manufacturers, including various radial and axial auxiliary lips. The tests described in this paper investigate the effect of several auxiliary dirt lips on seal life in a dust environment. Since many of these designs provide interference to the shaft for both primary and secondary lips, the tests also examined vacuum formation between the lips and its effect on the seal.