Your Reliability Engineering Professional Development Site
A listing in reverse chronological order of these article series:
Data and the analyses that use the data can be tricky to manage at best, let along extremely difficult.
In this last post of the series on using the maintenance data you have, Fred and James will answer many of the common questions asked about data and the analyses. [Read more…]
What you will learn from this article.
About a year ago, I wrote an article about the 6 signs of a reliable plant that got warm reception and a few nice comments. More interesting however was a private message I received from a Reliability Engineer who asked if I had a list of signs that a plant was in chaos and needed a wake up call to turn things around. I responded to the note, drafted a title page and a list of some of the sure signs a plant is in trouble.
This is the resulting article. [Read more…]
Every failure is part of a puzzle. The equipment we are maintaining is trying to communicate with use with each and every failure.
Often the message is not obvious.
There is the immediate failure. And, if we’re paying attention we can sort out the root cause of the failure along with replacing or repairing the damaged parts. Sometimes though the damage is caused by another issue with the system.
Something was hidden. [Read more…]
What you will learn from this article.
Agitated vessels and tanks are common throughout the process and chemical industries. A properly sized agitator with correct proportions to suit the tank will deliver well-mixed product. A correctly sized gearbox with well-chosen bearings and bearing arrangements will need only regular lubrication while giving years of trouble free service. [Read more…]
Let’s face it, your technicians have been entering data into the CMMS for years, but you haven’t been able to use it to make improvements. Is it because the data isn’t codified or it doesn’t have the right data points? Generally, this is how most maintenance managers will view their data, but it is incorrect. The CMMS does have data that you can use almost immediately. [Read more…]
What you will learn from this article.
The sole purpose of using process control in, say, the making of beer, is to detect what is happening during manufacture and to decide if something needs to be changed to insure the beer meets the necessary specification. The key words are ‘to detect’, ‘to decide’, ‘to change’ and ‘to meet specification’. A control loop can do all these things automatically. [Read more…]
Some incredible things seem to happen as you get older. When I was in my early twenties I had very little patience for small children. They were always making noise making a mess and demanding attention. I had all kinds of patience for work related things, if we were having a meeting on what caused our chemical reaction times to drift more than a full standard deviation outside the control limits, you had 100% of my attention. [Read more…]
One of the reasons that culture changes fail to change and stay that way is because there is nothing put in place to sustain it. When there is no plan to sustain the change, it will be a flavor of the week and revert back to the old ways. This is the final installment of a series on culture change and if you haven’t already, please go to the first post and start there. [Read more…]
What you will learn from this article.
Root Cause Analysis is a step by step method that leads to the discovery of a fault’s first or root cause. Every equipment failure happens for a number of reasons. There is a definite progression of actions and consequences that lead to a failure. An RCA investigation traces the cause and effect trail from the end failure back to the root cause. Much like a detective solving a crime. [Read more…]
The phone conversation starts with the words “Doug, I’ve got a big problem and I’m hoping you’ll be able to give me some insight as to how to resolve it.”
The call comes from a long-time client and someone I consider a friend. We not only worked together to start RCM effort at his company, we’ve hunted, golfed and attended a few sporting events together. Someone who if I’m working in his part of the country or just driving through I make a point to make a call so we can get together to and catch up on our lives. [Read more…]
Your culture change has a plan, it has the right people in place, and you are ready to roll it out. Your change stands a better chance of success than most change programs as you have a plan with the right people. Sometimes changes fail because the change is not embedded quickly, people lose interest and go back to their old ways. If you haven’t already, please start at the beginning of the series with the warning signs that you need a culture change. [Read more…]
What you will learn from this article.
A tornado can lift cars from the ground and hurl them hundreds of meters away. Chickens and ducks can be hurled kilometers away. The story of fish falling from the sky is explained by the power of a tornado to lift materials kilometers into the sky. The spinning vortex of air separates and segregates heavy and light objects. The heavy objects drop out sooner and the light objects are carried further. Cyclone separators and hydrocyclones work the same way. [Read more…]
Measure twice, cut once. This is what the sign read in our Apprentice Training shop at Eastman Kodak. Anyone who has worked for a living in the trades understands the true meaning behind this phrase. The intent is to help your company save time and money by doing things right the first time.
The sign really could be posted on the wall of every shop, every office and every conference room in every manufacturing plant around the world. It applies to more than the skilled trades. The sign in fact applies to every person and every job.
Do it right the first time! [Read more…]
People are the heart of any maintenance reliability program and they have the ability to make the program succeed or fail. This is why managing the change to reliability culture is critical. We covered a few of the key pieces to change management in the previous post. But sometimes, not matter what change management technique(s) you use, the change may not be successful. [Read more…]
