World War Two Ball Bearing Production

[Lynn Eades]

I guess it was the early war that saw Timken's rise. Many of the carrier wheel bearings I have seen are USA made.

[charlie fitton]

Oddly enough, I just read a few lines on smuggling (by boat) from Sweden...Fairmiles.....must have been mostly bearings.. Full link incl pics of a "fairmile Freighter" below..

"While MGB 502 and 503 went to the covert ops 15th MGB Flotilla upon completion in mid-1943 (and the last of class MGB 509 underwent a redesign to take more powerful petrol engines instead of the diesels), the other five boats had been identified as the most suitable hulls for conversion to fast blockade runners. They would be operating on the dangerous run across the North Sea to Sweden, where they would pick up consignments of vital ball bearings (from a moored British ship) and then run the gauntlet of German patrols to get the high-value cargo back to the UK.

The converted blockade runners were renamed Hopewell, Nonsuch, Gay Viking, Gay Corsair and Master Standfast. They had been modified to look as much like merchantmen as possible:


Almost convincing. And, if the disguise didn’t work, they could always leg it:


And they had a few Oerlikons and machine-guns, just so they could try and shoot their way out of trouble if they had to. Over the course of two winter seasons (maximum darkness) the boats were sent on journeys involving two-day trips each way, many of which were scrubbed due to bad weather or issues with the troublesome Paxman diesel engines. One boat was lost to enemy action and two were rendered non-operational in course of these hazardous operations."

https://www.quora.com/During-WW2-wha...edFbOx8QpIMXWU

[REL]

It gets better than that! Have a read: https://archive.org/details/CharlesH...e/n71/mode/2up

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally Posted by REL

It gets better than that! Have a read: https://archive.org/details/CharlesH...e/n71/mode/2up

Follow the money!

[Hanno Spoelstra]

This SKF - Made in Germany ball bearing came up on another forum:

Ok guys, I know that Sweden exported bearings to Germany, I also know Germany had bearing factories. I'm also very well aware of the fact that they wrote "made in Germany" on things. BUT, my question is: Did SKF (Svenska Kullagerfabriken) have production facilities in Germany??
283242294_10158351328390964_7240122752116470294_n.jpg

My response:
Check out the official SKF history timeline here: https://www.skf.com/group/organisati...story-timeline
“1921: Seven German ball bearing factories acquired. A new company formed in Germany - Vereinigte Kugellagerfabriken A.G. Production concentrated to Schweinfurt and Cannstatt.
1938: New ball bearing factory built outside Berlin.”
Nothing to report in Germany during 1939-1945. Then in 1948: “Post-war production began slowly in Schweinfurt and Cannstatt.”

And from https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sven...lagerfabriken: “Von 1929 bis 1953 hieß die SKF in Deutschland Vereinigte Kugellagerfabriken AG (VKF), mit Hauptsitz in Schweinfurt.”

So, it is unlikely one will find wartime bearings with “SKF made in Germany” inscription. A wartime bearing marked “VKF” may be found, although I suspect they used a factory code rather than a name to confuse Allied intelligence.

SKF itself does not publish a lot about its wartime exports, but historic research has proved that Sweden's export of ball-bearings to Germany during the Second World War attracted remarkably intensive international attention even at the time - read https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/....1975.10407803