-( The Maintenance War Newsletter )-
Feed Forward Publications
Vol-11
Web site www.feedforward.com.au


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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*** Special Edition. ***
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This is a special edition to our subscribers only. This news letter
has been syndicated from our feature author's website
http://www.lifetime-reliability.com. Many of you have read one or
more of the Author Mike Sondalini's 25 + books on our website. I am
sure you will find Mike's newsletter below just as informative.

If you like this newsletter format and content better than our
previous newsletters, let us know and we'll keep them coming. Hope
this helps.

Don Fitchett
Managing Editor
Feed Forward Publications


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--
Dear Subscriber,

Welcome to your 'Lifetime Equipment Reliability' newsletter.

Topics In This Newsletter

1) Maintenance and Reliability Secrets That Work - Lubrication The
Right Way.

2) A Long, Failure-Free Service Using Bearing Isolators.

3) Chose Operating And Maintenance Simplicity Above Engineering
Finesse.

4) Reliable Process Control And Instrumentation - Resin Encapsulation.

5) Manage And Leading Teams - Setting A Leader's Standards.

6) Using Affirmations in Maintenance and Reliability.

*********************************************

1) Maintenance And Reliability Secrets That Work - Lubrication The
Right Way.
Each month you get the important details of one of the 'secrets' to
greater equipment reliability. This month it's the first best-
practice to adopt for immediate increase in bearing mean time between
failures.
Have a lubrication regime where everything is lubricated when due and
you know the right lubricant gets all the way to where it should.

Until someone invents a way to run machines without bearings you are
going to need lubrication. In that case the lubrication needs to be
done right all the time if you want long, failure-free operating life.

There is a lot of information around already about good lubrication
practices. The theory of lubrication is now well understood and
reliably confirmed. There are a lot of good additives and filtration
methods around that extend lubricant life and let it handle extreme
environments and conditions.

You can look-up the telephone yellow pages or the Internet and find
able people in the industry to give you all the technical knowledge
that you want about lubricants and lubrication.

Yet even with so much knowledge around on lubrication, and so many
good products, our bearings keep failing much too early. It's not
usually the lubricant's fault!

But it can be because:

1) The wrong lubricant was chosen for the service conditions. (design
error)
2) Lubricant grades were swapped in-service. (instruction error)
3) The lubricant wasn't getting to where it should. (design error)
4) Process contamination got into the lubricant. (design error)
5) The load on the component was excessive and lubricant did not
prevent contact. (design error)
6) No one put the lubricant in. (instruction error)
7) The lubricant was mixed with another incompatible lubricant.
(instruction error)
8) Water ingress caused the lubricant to separate. (design error)
9) There was corrosion from the equipment components within the
lubricant. (design error)
10) The lubricant drained out past seals. (design error)
11) Old sludge and dirt was not properly removed during lubrication
replacement. (instruction error)
12) The lubricant degraded but was not renewed. (instruction error)
13) The bearing was over-lubricated. (design fault, instruction error)
14) The lubricant became contaminated by wear particles (design
error, instruction error)
15) Contaminated or unclean new lubricant was used. (design error,
instruction error)
16) Contamination was introduced during repair and rebuilds. (design
error, instruction error)

The problem is usually not the lubricant itself; unless it's unclean
when new (an ISO particle count will tell you if that is so). What
the list above shows is that bearing lubrication problems usually
result from a lack of design appreciation as to what happens in, and
to the equipment when it's used in the field. Or from a lack of good-
practice by the equipment operators and maintainers.

There are three things that you can do to improve the odds of
lubrication success when the equipment is already in-the-field.
First is to confirm you have the right, clean lubricant for the job.
Second is to insure that the lubricant is renewed before it becomes
unusable. Third is to insure that clean lubricant actually gets into
the bearing.

1) Use the right lubricant: Check the equipment manual recommendation
for each item of plant in its working location and record it in your
CMMS forever against that item of plant. If you don't have the
manuals then contact the manufacturer for their recommendations, as
a last resort contact the lubricant supplier for advice.

2) Renew the lubricant before it degrades: Place each item of
equipment on a lubrication route and set a frequency that reflects
the operating environment and the type of bearing used. More often
in dusty conditions, more often in hot or humid locations, more often
if you have process contamination, etc.

If the bearing design incorporates internal seals, then your
lubrication frequency will need to reflect the protective benefits of
the seals.

This means lubrication frequencies vary and may be weekly for some
plants and equipment and 3-monthly or longer for others.

3) Get fresh lubricant into the bearing elements: Look at drawings of
the bearing type and housing arrangement and follow the lubricant
flow route to satisfy yourself the fresh lubricant will get to the
bearing elements and replace the old lubricant.

With greased roller bearings, the best route is for the grease to
come into the center of the bearing race and flush out both sides.
This insures the freshest and cleanest grease is always in contact
with the rolling elements. It then become necessary to pick, or
design, bearing housings with this characteristic and to pick
bearings with grease holes through the center of the race.

If you have bearing housings with the grease injection point on one
side of the bearing then you need to insure the freshly injected
grease actually flows into the rolling elements and out the other
side. It is common to find bearing housings with a grease injection
point on the same side of the housing as the excess grease outlet.
Or on the same side as the shaft seal. In both cases the grease will
migrate out of the housing, through the excess grease outlet or shaft
seal, without having replaced the old grease around the rolling
elements.

Take a look around your plant and be sure that clean lubricant is
going into bearing housings and it actually does flow through the
bearing. Be sure your people know what are the right things to do
and to look for. If necessary get your lubricant supplier to do a
single-session, face-to-face lubrication training program for the
shop floor workers.

2) A Long Failure-Free Service Using Bearing Isolators!

Each month this section presents you with at least one item of
equipment that delivers years of failure-free service.

This month's example of long failure-free operating life is the use
of bearing isolators to keep the lubricant around bearings free from
contamination for years. This link takes you to an article by Heinz
Bloch in which he completely convinces you that magnetic bearing
protectors (also called magnetic bearing isolators) will give you
years of failure-free bearing life http://www.isomag.com/PDFS/Pump%
20Zone%20Reprint.pdf.

3) Chose Operating And Maintenance Simplicity Above Engineering
Finesse.

Do you use actuated dump valve feeders, screw feeders or rotary
valves for bulk powder mixer batching? The answer you pick can give
years of problems, or years of failure-free operation!

Most engineers and managers don't have to live with the problems
their technical decisions cause. But the plant operators and
maintainers do. I always go with what the operators and maintainers
want. That's because they know best when it comes to reducing
production time losses!

Once I know what the operators and maintainers know and need, I then
use my engineering knowledge and abilities to give them the best
engineered solution that works for them.

Let's take a closer look at the three options above for feeding bulk
materials and see what are their long term operating effects.

Actuated dump valves consist of the two valves, top and bottom,
pneumatic rams and linkages, air supply, a control box and its
components.

A rotary valve consists of the housing, rotor, bearings, drive motor
with chain or gearbox, power supply, a control box and its components.

A screw feeder consists of the housing, screw, bearings, drive motor
with chain or gearbox, power supply, a control box and its components.

The first question an operator and maintainer ask is "What trouble
does it cause me when it goes wrong?" (They are eternal skeptics!)

With a dump valve arrangement it'll usually be an actuator/ram, valve
or control solenoid that fails. You can swap anyone of them out for
new in about two hours, at low cost.

When a rotary valve fails it's a half day job at best to repair. And
much longer if you need to put in a new rotor, new tips, or swap out
the whole valve. A rotor repair/replacement is expensive, and needs
lots of planning, preparation and production disruption.

If a screw feeder goes down you are looking at a minimum three hour
job. It can be a complete strip-down to get to the bearing. It's
worse if the shaft has snapped or the flight edges have worn down or
been damaged - the entire shaft has to come out and be put back in.
This needs a lot of time and effort from many people.

The secret to successful manufacturing is to use equipment that
doesn't fail (it can have stoppages - but it must not fail and
require a rebuild or replacement). Make design and equipment choices
that keep production lost time down. Make equipment choices that
keep maintenance costs down.

Forget about the capital cost of equipment - it's nothing over the
life of the plant. A poor equipment choice will cost 10 times, 20
times, 30 times and more in production loss and maintenance cost over
its life than it cost to buy!

Never let capital cost be the driver of engineering decisions - make
life time cost the driver of all engineering decisions!

Engineering finesse is not important, capital cost is not important -
only lowest life-time cost is important! Always design plant, and
chose equipment, that deliver little production losses and few
maintenance requirements.

4) Reliable Process Control And Instrumentation - Resin Encapsulation.

A few weeks back we put up a new light pole over a pathway at work.
The light fitting came with a 400W light and an in-built light sensor
to turn it on and off depending on the sunlight strength.

The sensor was guaranteed for 1,500,000 switchings. Switching two
times a day meant it had 50 years of service life. That's the sort
of equipment you and I need more of! 50 years of failure-free life
is a very long time.

To achieve that working life the entire sensor and it's electronic
components were encased in resin to totally exclude the environment
from it.

The use of encasing compounds to extend service lives of electronic
components adds cost. But there maybe tremendous value that comes
with it!

No dust ingress, no moisture ingress, insulated against rapid
temperature changes, difficult to accidentally damage with tools,
able to sustain robust handling, etc. All these benefits seem like
very useful advantages for electronic equipment to have if you want
long failure-free service life.

I checked with Don Fitchett at www.bin95.com who does a lot of work
with Programmable Logic Controls (PLC's) and process control
equipment for his thoughts on encasing electronic components. Here's
what he said.
Hi Mike:
As an electronic engineer and an industrialist, I can see some
advantages. Most are for the manufacturer. Most of the time you do
not have a choice of components, but if given the choice, I would
choose NON - resin encased. If the circuit goes bad, I would like to
have the option of replacing the rectifier or component myself.
Let's face it, most companies are not around for long, or are under
new ownership, where guarantees are no longer honored. You may be
paying high dollar for a miraculous product guarantee that is
useless. It is common though, for devices such as light sensors to be
in resin, as the circuit is so cheap to manufacture, replacement is
the best option. As a consumer (not a maintenance person) this type
offer is common and would be acceptable.
When you get into items like electronic ignitions for cars (brain
boxes, black box, etc.) it is common to use resin for tamper
proofing. Some electronic products are set in resin to force
consumers to buy new instead of repair. In those situations you will
find that proprietary designs force high replacement costs compared
to the couple of dollars the circuit actually cost to build.
From a design point of view, resin can work either way. It causes the
product to be moisture proof (outside environments) and may actually
help dissipate circuit heat. On the other side of the coin, resin may
cause thermal runaway and shorten the life of the product. Another
thing I have seen is poor quality resin that cracked and actually
trapped moisture inside the component.
In summary, a guarantee is only as good as the life of the company.
The choice for resin encapsulation or not is dependent on the design
and the product. As an extreme example of a worst case scenario:
could you imagine going to replace an SCR in a motor drive only to
find out they encapsulated the circuit board in resin?
Don Fitchett, Business Industrial Network, www.BIN95.com
So ... there will be times when it's advantageous to encapsulate and
times when it's best not to. Encapsulation will limit your repair
choices in downtime situations.

5) Managing And Leading Teams - Setting A Leader's Standards.

Very few of us are born great managers and leaders. Yet we all can
be. Often our companies, families, peers and employees are looking
for us to lead them. Often our entire future success depends on how
good we are at getting people to make things happen as a co-
coordinated team.

I reckon I've finally worked out what to do to start becoming a great
leader.

To become a great leader you first start by raising your own
standards.

Before you can lead you have to know where to go.

You find the right direction by studying what the really great and
forward-thinking people in your industry are doing. You do that by
reading widely and thinking deeply about what you learn so you
understand what's going on. That's why you hear the saying
that 'leaders are readers'!

When you raise your own standards you set new benchmarks to reach.
You set a new, higher direction to follow. You attune yourself to
success. You have a plan and a path to follow. You are then in a
position to lead and manage people because you know more than them.

And that's when the trouble starts!

Once you start reading about the best practices of leaders in your
field you come to know what to do. You know the better ways to do
things. You know what needs to be done. But no one else does! Nor
do most people care to know more than what's just enough to do their
jobs.

At this stage there are a few things that can happen to you as a
budding leader.

You can get moody and introverted because you cannot convince other
people to follow you down this better path. You will try to change
them, but they will react against you. This makes you angry and you
stop bothering to try change the 'system'. Who wants the hassles
anyway?

You may start getting bossy and forcing people to do what you want
done. If you are in charge of them they will follow your
instructions, but they won't 'buy-in' to your better ways. You will
see that and start thinking that they don't care about their job.
You'll start wishing you had better, more competent people working
for you.

One other thing that could happen to you is that you will change your
job because you cannot get satisfaction at your current work place.
But you will only come across the same problems in the new job.
People are pretty much the same where ever you go.

My friend ... don't give up! You have to go back and do what you did
to get your higher understanding in the first place. You have to go
back to studying better ways of leading people.

This time it's not best industry practice that you study - this time
you study best human management and leadership practices. This time
you study how to get teams working together, how to motivate people,
how to handle yourself in situations, how to manage and lead
others ... and so on.

Knowledge is power over your situation and your circumstances! You
can never know enough about your industry, about how people's minds
work and about how your mind works.

Read widely, think deeply, gain understanding so that you reach
higher standards and you know what to do and how to get there with
the people you have!

6) Using Affirmations in Maintenance and Reliability.

I hope that this one does not freak you out - it's only meant to
challenge your thinking!

What have affirmations got to do with maintenance and reliability?

They ought to be in your personal improvement tool kit. They can
change your future in the maintenance and reliability industry!

I've read personal improvement books for nearly 20 years. Every book
I've read on the subject has helped me in some way. But I never
found a way to change the person I am inside until I really
understood what affirmations do to you.

Take this one here - "I am a caring, loving father (or mother, etc)
and give my kids a loving hug twice a day."

If you read that affirmation several time a day that is what you will
do and become. How can you keep telling yourself those words three,
four, five times a day and then not do it? You cannot. You must
start to give hugs to your kids and show them you care.

That is the power of affirmations - they can change your future
behavior. They help you to become the person you want to be. They
help you handle situations that you now have trouble with.

Take this one - "I have a world-class maintenance crew (or
production, construction, etc crew) who do top quality work quickly
and safely at controlled costs."

It would make you emotional to read that several times a day, and
then to see that in reality it's not true. You would start to find
ways to make it come true. If you stuck with it long enough, you
would eventually create a world-class maintenance crew.

This sort of affirmation will get you reading books, going to
seminars, talking to your more experienced piers, listening in on
conversations whenever you hear the words 'team building' ... you
would become animated and active in building a world-class
maintenance crew.

Affirmations influence your self-talk and your self-belief! And once
you think you can do something, then you start to do it!

Experiment with affirmations. Get a packet of 3" x 5" ruled cards
and start doing some tests on yourself. The rules with affirmations
are 1) they must be written a the positive form, 2) they must be
present tense, i.e. in the 'now', 3) you must accomplish the task
i.e. I am ..., I have .... It is like me to ..., etc.

Sometimes you have to state an affirmation as a question so you can
get your subconscious working for you. For example "How do I create
a world-class maintenance crew (or production, construction, etc
crew) who do top quality work quickly and safely at controlled
costs?" This affirmation will get you waking up at three in the
morning with 'aha' ideas!

I've got a page on the web site where you can get a bit more detail
on using affirmations for maintenance and reliability improvements.
Click on this link http://www.lifetime-
reliability.com/affirmation.html. On that page you will see a link
to a company selling affirmation software. You don't need it, but
they have a lot of very detailed information on how affirmations
work. If you take the link, and you do buy any of their products,
I'll get an affiliate payment.

************************************************
Please come back for more next month. Tell the people you know about
this newsletter so that they can subscribe too.
Best regards to you,
Mike Sondalini
Lifetime Reliability - Where Outstanding Industrial Plant And
Equipment Reliability Is Normal.
Email: mailto:info@...
Web: http://www.lifetime-reliability.com
Post: PO Box 578, BENTLEY, WA, 6102, AUSTRALIA
Phone: +61 8 9457 0742


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Don Fitchett
Managing Editor
Feed Forward Publications
http://www.feedforward.com.au
Email: info@...

Tel : (573) 547-5630
www.feedforward.com.au teaches your maintenance crew engineering and
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