As infrastructure and agriculture market continue to grow, demand for hydraulic motors is here to stay.<span style="font-weight: bold;"> Marc-Oliver Nagel, Sales Subsidiary Manager India, Poclain Hydraulics, </span>shares more on the market and technology trends. <p></p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">How important is hydraulic motors in construction equipment? </span><br />Hydraulic motors are one of the major components of mobile construction equipment. You can find them in compactors, skid steer loaders, excavators or in horizontal drilling machines, and these are only a few examples. Hydraulic motors are today the state-of-the-art technology of drivetrains and for most of the function construction equipment has. </p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">What are the types of hydraulic motors used in construction equipment?</span><br />You can find several types of hydraulic motors, depending on the job to perform. For me, the best type is a radial piston motor. We have motors for almost every need in the right size. Our portfolio offers motors from 172 ccm to 30,000 ccm. We produce these motors in several configurations, as multipurpose motor or as specialised motor dedicated for a single function, like a swing drive motor with integrated valves. However, the technology of all these motors is the same; a radial pistons design.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">What are the key criteria to choose a suitable hydraulic motor? </span><br /> We must know the customer needs and expectations. Our sales and application engineers will review together with the customers the specification line by line. For example, if you want to equip a wheel drive function, the performance data most people have in mind are speed, gradeability and traction effort. To calculate it, we need various information. To give you an impression, dimensions of the wheel, friction coefficients, weight distribution, available input power, etc. By taking into account the complete technical specification, our application engineers will calculate, for example, the weight transfers and the friction limits to gain a clear picture of speed and gradeability. Based on the duty cycle, we will calculate the expected lifetime. All these are criteria to choose the best suitable motor as well as the best suitable pump.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">What are the emerging technology trends in hydraulic motors?</span><br /> We see a clear trend to a higher number of integrated functions, like integrated valves, more sensors and a higher diversity. This is why we have increased the number of different motor types over the last years: MZ motors for swing drives, steerable MG motors or the CDM range (a clutchable double shaft motor) or the latest launched range, the MI motors. The time of one fits all is gone as the market is demanding a dedicated product without any compromises. Thanks to the modular design we have, we are able to offer these dedicated products with the same quality standard as all our products, by using standardised parts like cylinder blocks and cams. </p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">What are the key features of hydraulic motors that improve equipment productivity/efficiency?</span><br />If you see our high torque and low speed motor, you can find several benefits to improve the productivity and efficiency. One of the biggest benefits is, you do not need a gearbox and you have saved a component in between, no additional efficiency coefficient, which will reduce the total efficiency in your system. The same will contribute to an increased productivity, one component less to maintain, one component less which could fail, in the end, you will have a reduced downtime. A second big benefit of our hydraulic motors is the pressure we can work with, 450 bar for MS motors and 500 bar with our MHP motors.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">How are hydraulic motors complying with the emission norms?</span> <br />You are right; it is not only the combustion engine to be focused on. Hydraulic motors can consume a big part of the available power. In our product launches of the past years, you will discover that we had a big focus on efficiency. We launched HighFlow? versions with optimised performances and keeping all the qualities that have made the MS motor range such a success. One of the benefits of the HighFlow? motors are the reduction of the internal pressure drops a direct link to a better efficiency. Beyond this, Poclain launched a completely new range of hydraulic motors, the MHP range. Thanks to its innovative design, the MHP motor provides 'Unprecedented Performances' on cam lobe motors: Higher maximum pressure and higher rotation speeds, up to 500 bar and more than 500 rpm and a next level efficiency. In the end, these innovative products will reduce the power losses in the system and contribute to be within the new norms.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">How are you prepared for the next level of emission norms?</span><br />In Poclain, around six per cent of our sales turnover is invested in research and development (R&amp;D) and innovation is in our DNA. We will continue with the developments and improvements we did at the previous mentioned HighFlow? motors and the MHP range. In parallel, we are focusing together with our customer on electro hydraulic systems. By replacing the combustion engine with an electric motor and the needed batteries, we will gain the perfect compromise of performance, low or no emission and costs.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">How electronic and IoT-enabled features are transforming hydraulic motors? What is the trend?</span><br />The complete hydraulic system will be more and more embedded into the data management systems of the application. Several sensors integrated in motors, pumps, valves, etc will provide a lot of information in the same time to monitor the health of the system and operate it at the most efficient modus operandi. To be state-of-the-art or better one step ahead, we have a beside, the Electronic Product Line, responsible for soft- and hardware products, a department only responsible for Big Data and IoT. </p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">How do you see the market growth of hydraulic motors going forward? </span><br />First of all, the infrastructure projects are going on, like India's road construction per day is about 27 km. Or projects like One Belt, One Road (better known as New Silk Road) are beyond of everything of the past as this infrastructure project covers more than 60 countries. </p><p>Second, please do not forget the agriculture market. Hydraulic motors are used in many applications like combined harvester, forage harvester, rice harvesters, sprayers, mini loaders or cattle feeder mixers. An increasing population will lead in a higher need of food. </p><p>Considering all these, I believe the market growth will definitely continue. Nevertheless, we are linked to global economy and we face the same downturns and upturns, but overall the market will grow.</p><p> <span style="font-weight: bold;">What is your outlook on the market for hydraulic motors?</span><br /> Hydraulic motors will have a great future. All over the world, more and more electro hydraulic machines are under development or already launched. For an innovative company as Poclain, it is totally logical to be part of this transformation and therefore we have a team who is working on these solutions. Today, electro hydraulic machines are seen as advanced machines, made for the future or to show what is possible. </p><p>But with time moving fast, these advanced machines will become sooner state-of-the-art as some of us may think. </p>