Applying Acoustic Vibration Monitoring to Predictive Maintenance

"This equipment has given us completely new opportunities to plan maintenance activities in advance. This has meant that we've been able to minimize the number of breakdowns, thus increasing our profits." A look in the rear-view mirror tells us that before 1993, the mill suffered three or four breakdowns, caused by stock damage, every year. After installation of the SPM system, breakdowns have been very rare, which has made it possible to avoid production losses worth millions.

Recoating based on visible rust is a form of reactive maintenance, when coating failure and rust formation are the reason for repairs or replacements. Erosion is a far more effective reason for recoating. Maintenance based on erosion is a form of preventive maintenance where repairs are performed to prevent a more serious future failure.

When I am working with clients across multiple disciplines, I am sometimes surprised when they tell me they have the wrong people in some key positions and my task as the business coach or consultant will be to turn these wrong people into the right people. So, what went wrong? I believe there are two answers to this question. Either their hiring process was not up to the job, or in the time the employee had been with the company, the company had turned the right person into the wrong person.

Reliability Block Diagrams have been around for a very long time, helping system engineers understand how the various elements, and their relationships, could impact the overall reliability and operation of the system. Taking the effort to diagram a system logically can provide great insight into where the weak links are. In some cases, an RBD can expose that your assumed redundancies are not actually as effective as you think they are. 

Damaged hydraulic cylinder rods and wiper seals are an eternal problem for users of hydraulic machinery. Dents and gouges on the surface of hydraulic cylinder rods reduce seal life and give dust and other contaminants an easy path into the hydraulic system. Many hydraulic cylinders also have bent rods, which cause distortion and ultimately premature failure of the seals.

The focus of the previous installment was on cooling water microbiological fouling and control basics, as fouling can cause the most prompt and intense damage in cooling systems.  However, scaling and corrosion can be problematic as well.  Because scale and corrosion control programs often overlap, the next two installments will outline, respectively, primary scale-forming and corrosion mechanisms (scale formation in cooling water systems).  We will tie these together in Part 5 when examining the evolution of scale/corrosion control programs.