Axial Piston Pumps for Maximum Pressure

Axial piston pumps are designed for extremely high pressures. In addition to their performance, axial piston pumps impress with a compact design and simple operation. However, technically they are extremely complex, which can make their maintenance a challenge.

Axial Piston Pumps: Design and Function

Axial piston pumps generate hydraulic pressure by pressing oil through sleeves and lines with the help of pistons.

These pistons are mounted on a rotating swash plate. The alignment of the pistons is parallel to the axis of rotation of this swash plate. This is why the axial piston pump gets its name: the pistons are axially aligned.

The circularly arranged pistons are connected to the swash plate via a freely mounted connecting rod in so-called “ball socket bearings”. The steeper the angle of the swash plate, the deeper the pistons can penetrate their sleeves, and the higher the pressure they can generate. This pressure regulation function can be achieved via a simple hand lever mounted on the outside of the housing. The pressure regulation is essentially stepless.

In practice, most axial piston pumps use predefined pressure stages set by detent positions of the manual lever. Equally often, axial piston pumps are equipped with automatic pressure regulation.

Axial piston pumps operate in a suction-pressure manner. Like all piston machines, the cylinders in an axial piston pump also have an upper and lower dead center. When the upper dead center is reached, the piston draws pressure-reduced oil from the hydraulic system. As soon as the lower dead center is reached, the piston pushes the oil back into the hydraulic system, thereby generating the desired working pressure. Depending on how far the piston penetrates the hydraulic cylinder, the pressure falls or rises. In this way, working pressures of up to 500 bar can be generated.

Application of Axial Piston Pumps

Axial piston pumps are designed for heavy to very heavy hydraulic tasks. They are used to build up particularly high pressures. Their area of application is thus defined for correspondingly demanding tasks. These include:

• Heavy construction vehicles such as crawlers, excavators, dump trucks, wheel loaders
• Moving heavy static equipment, e.g., lifting platforms, gates, or ramps
• Driving powerful hydraulic motors, e.g., in shipbuilding
• Generating clamping pressure for compression or injection molding tools
• Generating pressure for hydraulic presses

Axial piston pumps can be regulated down to 0 bar, which makes starting them particularly easy. Unlike vane or screw pumps, axial piston pumps generate virtually no back pressure in the neutral position.

The drive machine can thus be accelerated to its full operating torque at leisure before the radial piston pump is engaged, by gradually increasing the working pressure.

The advantages of axial piston pumps are:

• High pressures can be generated
• Stepless pressure adjustment from 0 bar to maximum pressure
• Insensitive to dirt due to complete encapsulation
• Particularly easy to start due to stepless, pressureless operating mode
• Narrow, compact design
• Insensitive to temperature

The disadvantages of axial piston pumps are:

• Expensive to purchase
• Complex design, making maintenance and repair more difficult
• Increased maintenance and monitoring requirements due to high pressures
• Only delayed pressure change possible under full load
• Can oscillate with changes in acceleration
• Increased risk of cavitation
• Elongated design
• High energy consumption

Axial piston pumps are the optimal component for many applications. Due to high operating pressures, their compact design, and ease of use, they are particularly well suited for most high-pressure hydraulic applications.

Buy Axial Piston Pumps:

Our K3V/K3VL series axial piston pumps are available from us as a modular system and can be delivered from stock.

Sizes of Axial Piston Pumps

Sizes from 28 – 200 ccm/revolution are available. We offer axial piston pumps with various controller variants.

Depending on your needs, you can obtain axial piston pumps with pressure control, load-sensing control, electronically proportional flow control, or in conjunction with a power controller. The control elements are interchangeable and can be adapted to the system parameters. Axial piston pumps can also be combined with through-drives up to the same size.

Spare Parts Supply for Axial Piston Pumps

We also supply the necessary spare parts for repairing your axial piston pump. We carry suitable rotating groups/barrels, return plates, control plates, pistons, and seal kits in our range. This includes, for example, Kawasaki pumps.

If you have any questions about axial piston pumps or need prices, our staff will be happy to assist you.