-( The Maintenance War Newsletter )-

Feed Forward Publications
Volume 13

Web site www.feedforward.com.au

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
*** Topics from the front line. ***
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

1. Topic: "Electric Power"

2. Featured Article: "M2M Device Networking" - by Marty Huff

3. Reader Feedback: "Anti friction bearing Clearance Adjustments".

4. Technical Help: "Indirect Addressing - A PLC Programming Tip"

5. Management Help: "Indirect labor hours"

6. Human Resource: "Let's Talk Human Resource"

7. The World Wide Web: "Recommendations"

8. World Industry News.

_________________________________________________

************* RE: Electric Power *****************
_________________________________________________

Welcome to the 13th issue of our Feed Forward Newsletter; "The
Maintenance War Newsletter". This first area of the newsletter is for
introductions and commentary. Remember, the website has many new
items added each month. So please browse around and find yourself a
gold nugget.
Online version at www.feedforward.com.au

Since our last issue we have started to deliver Palm / PDA software
products and power point presentation products. We started out with
one new product for each new media type. We are actively working on
developing and finding you more of those type products.

Be sure to download the free trial Electronic and Electrical
Calculator Palm Software. Our first power point to offer is
titled "Maintenance Management Guide".

http://www.bin95.com/palm/Free_Palm_Software_downloads.htm
http://www.feedforward.com.au/Maintenance_Management_PPT.htm

Our newest Ebook title is by Larry Bush. Be sure to browse the free
samples of his Ebook, "How to Purchase, Setup and Maintain Emergency
Diesel Electric Generators"
http://www.feedforward.com.au/emergency_power_generator.htm

We have also added a couple new Computer Based Training (CBT) CDs. If
you have experienced our award winning PLC Training CBT, you will
want to see our new Control Logix CBT. We have also recently added a
Measurement Methods CBT.

http://www.feedforward.com.au/plc_trainer_rslogix.htm
http://www.feedforward.com.au/controllogix_rslogix_5000.htm
http://www.feedforward.com.au/precision_measurement.htm

Also the very detailed M2M Device Networking article by Marty Huff is
new on the site.

http://www.feedforward.com.au/Preventive_Maintenance_Technology.htm

The article is about how the ability to extract raw data from a
device, machine, or appliance, and convert that data into useful
information, transforms the decision-making from an art to a science.

In the last issue of "The Maintenance War Newsletter", we started an
initiative dubbed "Change the world". One submitted article stands
out as being in line with the initiative's goals.

Frank Lincoln donated the white paper "Electronic Electricity
Repository (EER)", about a new approach to storing electricity. While
we are not validating his theories by publishing them, our hat is off
to Frank for his thought provoking article and his intentions to make
the world we live in a better place to live.

http://www.feedforward.com.au/Electronic_Electricity_Repository.pdf


You never know, Frank's article may spawn the next invention to make
our appliances even smaller and consume less energy. :>)

Also if you have had past interest in our ebooks, CDs etc. I should
let you know until Dec 25th, a Christmas gift icon will be appearing
by various products on the website, indicating temporary discounts up
to 70% !! Happy Holidays.
__________________________________________

********** FEATURED ARTICLE **************
__________________________________________

Enabling New Possibilities for Preventive Maintenance
By Marty Huff

Today, most businesses rely on networks for sharing information among
employees and customers. Yet this is only a small piece of the
information that can be shared. Machines and appliances - essentially
any electronic or electro-mechanical device with a sensor, controller
or microprocessor - contains a great deal of information about its
status, performance and usage.

The ability to extract raw data from a device, machine or appliance
and convert that data into useful information transforms the decision-
making from an art to a science. You can now leverage Internet, Wi-Fi
and Cellular technologies to relay information anywhere, anytime.
This unique combination of factors has converged into a powerful new
paradigm known as M2M (machine-to-machine, machine-to-man and machine-
to-mobile).

M2M constitutes the next notable phase in preventive maintenance, a
phase that opens up a whole new world of possibilities including:

* The ability to know the status of a piece of equipment no matter
where you are, by having alerts sent to a web browser, PDA, pager or
cell phone.

* The potential to know which part needs repair or replacement
before you dispatch a technician, which can save time and money.

* Enhanced tools that provide the ability to analyze and track a
machine's history, in order to spot trends and more accurately
predict maintenance requirements well in advance.

For those industries such as wastewater, where accurate regulatory
reporting is key, M2M strategies can create and deliver periodic
reports automatically and help reduce the likelihood of fines.

For example, a central server can monitor several remote cell phone
towers via the Internet. Let's say the beacon light on one of the
towers fails. The application running on the server recognizes the
failure which triggers a local alarm, sends an email alert over the
Internet to the FCC, and forwards a cell phone message to a
technician.

At that point, the technician can browse to a Web page through a Web-
enabled cell phone in order to acknowledge the alarm and enter an
estimated time for the repair. Knowing at this point the nature of
the repair, the technician responds with the correct parts in hand to
repair the light. To top it off, all of this information can be made
available to an enterprise software application or authorized company
staff.

Using simple plug-and-play modules, you can now connect devices
directly into legacy systems and create peer-to-peer device networks,
even with many types of equipment that have overlooked in the past.
In many cases, it is possible to connect to a single machine and gain
access to a majority of facilities equipment.

With M2M device networking, intelligent devices, however remote, are
capable of relaying data and sending alerts, alarms, and commands to
cell phones, PDAs, databases and other intelligent devices. Devices
can also be "Web-enabled" and accessible using a standard Web
browser.

This article outlines the components required for an M2M system,
demonstrating how easy it is to implement an enhanced maintenance
management system with just a few basic requirements. For OEM's, an
M2M system can provide an incredible opportunity to provide enhanced
customer service and distinguish their products from the competition.

M2M Components:

There are basically four components in an M2M system:
1) the intelligent device (machine or appliance) where the data
originates,
2) the gateway that extracts and translates data,
3) the network which serves the data and
4) the remote client which ultimately receives the data. M2M software
applications are optional but can facilitate communications, enable
Web access and provide the user interface.

Please See the following pages to continue with this Preventive
Maintenance Technology Article...

The Intelligent Device: Where The Data Originates
http://www.feedforward.com.au/DeviceNet.htm

The Gateway: Translates and Passes The Data To The Network
http://www.feedforward.com.au/ethernet_gateway.htm

The Network: The Connectivity That Serves Data To The Remote Client
http://www.feedforward.com.au/ethernet_gateway.htm#The Network

The Remote Client: The Destination Of The Information
http://www.feedforward.com.au/industrial_application.htm

Marty Huff - MSI Tec, Inc.
http://www.msitec.com/

About the Author: Marty Huff is an IT professional with MSI Tec and
can be reached directly at 720-875-9835 or by email at
mailto:martyh@.... MSI Tec is a provider of intelligent
machine control components and systems, and the value adding
engineering resources for the successful identification and
implementation of their use.

Marty is responsible for M2M systems design, programming and
installation and is available for dedicated training programs and
seminars on the subject of M2M.

Don Fitchett, Business Industrial Network, contributor to this
article.
http://www.bin95.com/

_____________________________________________

********* READER FEEDBACK ****************
_____________________________________________

Subject: Anti friction bearing Clearance Adjustments

Dear sir ,
Could you provide me some technical literature on " Anti friction
bearing Clearance Adjustments " or with some information covering
Anti friction bearings in detail .

Regards, Asif

__________________

Dear Asif:

'Anti-friction bearings' are your plain and simple roller bearings.

Yes they may need to be set up with some clearance for growth in hot
conditions. As they get hotter the parts expand and the clearances
reduce to the right 'hot running' clearance for the bearing. Most
roller bearings are made with a range of clearance options to select
from to suit shaft diameters, temperatures and loads.

In some situations the bearing is pre-loaded with a force to insure
race and rollers are touching. This tends to reduce noise when the
bearing is under operating conditions and provide more accurate
locating.

The best place to get detailed advice on bearing clearance is from
the bearing supplier. They know what clearances to set their bearings
to. FAG, SKF, Timken, etc all have detailed catalogues giving much
information on setting up bearing clearances.

Best regards, Mike Sondalini

____________________________________________

************ TECHNICAL HELP ***************
____________________________________________

Indirect Addressing - A PLC Programming Tip

Example: B3:0/[N7:0]

A typical internal (PLC relay) output address for an Allen Bradley
PLC would be B3:0/5 and would be described as the 6th bit (output) in
word 3.

When you use B3:0/[N7:0] in a rung as an output, the actual B3 bit
level address that will be output is dependent on what value is
stored in memory location N7:0 at the time the rung was scanned.

If N7:0 has a value of 6 in it, then B3:0/[N7:0] is actually B3:0/6

N7:0 = 13 then

B3:0/[N7:0] = B3:0/13

So to show how indirect addressing can save a PLC programmer both
development time and PLC memory resources, I use the following
example.

Say we wanted to activate in sequence, 16 outputs, each for one
second, one after the other. Typically that would take 16 rungs and
16 timers as well as conditions for each rung that ties it to the
previous.

With indirect addressing, you could do the same with 2-3 rungs and 1
timer. You would start with N7:0 = 0 for B3:0/0 output, then after a
1 second timer, add 1 to N7:0, so now output B3:0/1 is activated.

After timer times up, again add 1 to N7:0 so now B3:0/2 activates,
etc. etc. There is a little more to it than this newsletter has room
to explain, but you get the basic idea.

As a special offer to our existing customers, we will give you a free
copy of our example program BIN95-L531 just for asking. This example
SCL500 program has other examples on how to capitalize on the
capabilities of the SLC 500 5/03 processor.

(This free gift to existing customers has sold for $45 and requires
RSLogix 500 to view, a SLC 500 if you want to experiment with it and
learn even more.)
__________________________________________________

*************** MANAGEMENT HELP ******************
__________________________________________________

Indirect labor hours

One reader asks: "What's the best possible way to reduce cost when
direct labor hours utilized are far less then the indirect labor
hours"?

From the limited information I would speculate your area of greatest
cost savings would be to focus on reduction of the support
personnel's hours.

This would consist of incorporating many lean methodologies to the
areas of their responsibility. An example would be the task of
changing light bulbs in the facility. Typically, a light bulb burns
out, someone is called to change it. A lean analysis of the task at
hand goes something like this...

1) A phone call to maintenance.
2) A work order generated.
3) The task is scheduled.
4) A person gets the ladder out and a light bulb from stock.
5) A person changes it.
6) A person puts back the ladder
7) The work order is updated and closed.

The above seven items equals the man-hours to change a light bulb.
The larger the facility, the more a scenario occurs where the
maintenance person returns to the same general area again in that
week to replace another light bulb. It has been proven in large
office buildings that a huge savings in man hours can be seen by
changing all light bulbs in a given area at one time whether they are
burnt out or not. (You save the time it takes for 6 of the 7 steps
above, multiplied by the amount of light bulbs in that room. Then
multiply that savings multiplied by the amount of rooms responsible
for maintaining to see an annual savings.)

Basically light bulbs of the same model number will all last the same
amount of hours. Therefore if you change them all in a room at the
same time, when one burns out the next time, it will be time to
change them all out as the others are soon to burn out.

This is just one of thousands of lean ideas that can be applied to
reduce support man hours. If you are using a work order/CMMS system,
you may be able to identify the areas of greatest cost and focus on
them first with lean ideas.

Hope this helps

____________________________________________________

************** HUMAN RESOURCE **********************
____________________________________________________

Below are some great resources to exchange ideas with your fellow
maintenance managers. Swap ideas with others, now that is a human
resource that isn't used enough. (Sites that were email only have
been excluded.)

Also we would be grateful to hear your ideas on how the maintenance
manager can better utilize their company's human resource department.
Email us your thoughts and we may use it for the next newsletter.

The Toast Forum at Idcon - over 100 topics, over 300 registered
members. On the Maintenance and Reliability Discussion Forum, the
general maintenance management section topic and the Computerized
Maintenance Management Systems (CMMS) topic are the most popular.

http://www.idcon.com/toastforum6503/toast/toast.asp


Reliability Magazine® Message Boards - over 5000 topics, over 60,000
posts, leans more towards the mechanics of managing a maintenance
department with the hot topic being the Alignment/Balancing/Vibration
Forum.

http://www.reliability-magazine.com/ubb2000/cgi/Ultimate.cgi?
action=intro

MaintenanceForums.com - almost a 100 topics, over 700 registered
members. Their most popular topic is the Machinery Condition
Monitoring and Predictive Maintenance topic.

http://maintenanceforums.com/eve/ubb.x

Even industry specific forums can surprise you with a wealth of
information and peers to network with. Take Saferpak Discussion
Forums for example, over 3000 posts, and 541 registered members.
Their focus is the Food [Packaging] Safety, Quality Management &
Business Improvement topic discussions.

http://www.saferpak.com/forum/index.php

Yahoo groups.

Science > Engineering > Industrial
http://dir.groups.yahoo.com/dir/Science/Engineering/Industrial

Google news groups.

sci.engr.manufacturing
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&group=sci.engr.manufacturing

sci.engr
http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&group=sci.engr

___________________________________________________

************** THE WORLD WIDE WEB *****************
____________________________________________________

Below are some websites I recommend you see ...

Mega-zine - active ezines accessible via the WEB and E-mail.
http://www.eplanetnews.biz/

Aerostrip Australia - national distributor for a range of
environmentally friendly products.
http://www.sea2skyglobal.com/

Insider Secrets to Hydraulics - trouble shooting on hydraulic pumps
http://www.insidersectretstohydraulics.com/

____________________________________________________

************** WORLD INDUSTRY NEWS *****************
____________________________________________________


ARCwire for the Week Ending October 29,2004 reaching over 60,000
professionals worldwide.

Please forward this to a colleague. Anyone can sign up for a free
subscription on their Web site at http://www.ARCweb.com

* Significant Asset Management Trends
* Electric Power Industry Capital Expenditure Shows Stark Regional
Contrasts
* New European Standard for RFID in UHF Frequencies
* Apriso Advisory Council Meeting
* SAP and HP Offer Hosted Solutions
_______________________________________

===== ARC BENCHMARKING SURVEYS =====
>> Significant Asset Management Trends
The Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) market is reaching maturity
making it more difficult to differentiate between products. Recent
ARC research has identified a number of important new asset
management trends that provide opportunity for product
differentiation, offer attractive value propositions, and have strong
potential for driving future EAM market growth. Your participation in
this ARC survey will help to qualify the real value and importance of
each of these identified asset management trends.

Those who take the survey will receive a copy of the results for
FREE. To take the survey, please click here:
www.arcweb.com/ss2/wsb.dll/ARC/EAMTrends.htm

===== INDUSTRY TRENDS =====
>> Electric Power Industry Capital Expenditure Shows Stark Regional
Contrasts
Worldwide capital and operational expenditures for plants in the
electric power industry, which totaled more than $374 billion in
2003, will exceed $453 billion by the end of 2008, expanding at a
Compounded Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of just under four percent.
While China strains to grow a reliable power infrastructure in
support of rapid industrial growth, North American spending continues
to decline as the recent bulge of generation development, combined
with higher natural gas prices, create both a glut of generating
capacity and a squeeze on operating margins.

>> New European Standard for RFID in UHF Frequencies
The use of RFID tags in the European Supply Chain has taken a great
step forward with the approval by the European Telecommunications
Standards Institute (ETSI) of a new standard for the use of RFID in
UHF frequencies. This news has even greater impact now that the
Frequency Management Working Group of the European Conference of
Postal and Telecommunications Administrations has approved the
recommendation to make the frequency band associated with this
standard available in their 46 Member countries.

The ETSI Technical Committee - Electromagnetic compatibility and
Radio spectrum Matters (ERM), has delivered a two part Standard (EN
302 208) that gives the industry much needed guidance on the minimum
characteristics considered necessary to make the best use of the
available frequencies for RFID. This new standard will allow
companies to market High Power RFID tags and readers in all national
markets of the European Union and EFTA, by showing compliance with
the European Union Radio & Tele-communications Terminal Equipment
Directive (R&TTE Directive).

===== COMPANY NEWS & BRIEFINGS =====

>> Field Report: Apriso Advisory Council Meeting
By Greg Gorbach, ARC Advisory Group

The recent Apriso Advisory Council Meeting was not your typical
User's Group meeting. It was more of an intense working session among
partners. Led by Apriso, the group tackled some weighty questions
about product roadmaps and company direction. The activities ranged
from helping contribute to and refine Apriso's mission statement, to
some very detailed product functionality areas. It is clear that
Apriso highly values the contributions of the group - and for good
reason.

Key topics addressed included manufacturer's needs for collaborative
Operations Management solutions at the multi-plant level, and the
growing demand for Plant to Business (P2B) Interoperability. For
obvious reasons I will not go into details about all of the subjects
discussed, but suffice it to say that with this kind of a group in
place, Apriso will be a force to be reckoned with.

===== ACQUISITIONS & PARTNERING NEWS =====
>> SAP and HP Offer Hosted Solutions
SAP America, Inc. and HP introduced new managed solutions for midsize
companies that provide software, services and support through a
single point of contact at a fixed total monthly cost. The managed
solutions will include software and implementation services from SAP.
HP offers operations, infrastructure hosting, storage-on-demand,
business recovery solutions, managed Web solutions and security
services.

"This announcement is quite significant," states John Moore, ARC
Advisory Group. "First, SAP, which has not been a big supporter of
the hosted software subscription model appears to have acquiesced to
a growing industry trend (and possibly a competitive threat), which
has seen particular traction in the SMB market, for which this
solution is targeted.

Secondly, SAP is not only working with HP, but it is also working
closely with some of its smaller partners to provide industry
specific solutions in such verticals as food & beverage, hi-tech
electronics, and oil & gas distribution. This is a savvy move by SAP
as one of the main detractors to hosted solutions provided by other
suppliers has been their one size fits all approach.

By providing more specific vertical industry functionality, an
adopter of one of SAP's vertical solutions will receive a certain
level of customization not currently found in competing offerings."

______________________________________________________________________


Best regards and thanks for being a subscriber to this newsletter.


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
asset care knowledge so that they can solve more problems, become
more knowledgeable, make better decisions and your plant runs more
reliably!