Your Reliability Engineering Professional Development Site
It is hard to imagine but only a few years ago not everything was on the internet. Google was established in 1998 and as search became prevalent, there was an explosion of online for anyone to access.
From 2008-2010, I went through exercise of collecting and analyzing incident data from 2000-2010 with help from Dr. Amy Liu. Mostly downstream – refineries and petrochemicals.
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Between 1670 and 1700, the Royal Navy installed lead sheets over the hulls of some ships to help preserve them and reduce repairs. (See Failure Modes of Lead Hull Sheathing Explored by the Royal Navy.) Galvanic corrosion attacked the iron bolts holding the hull and rudder together, so the program had to be canceled.
The British reverted to their previous practice of installing thin wood sheathing on top of the main hull. The wood sheathing was sacrificial and had to be replaced every few years. When the sheathing was stripped for replacement, inspection and repair of the main hull was accomplished.
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Anyone who knows me may also know about my father, Charles Latino, and his lifelong contribution to the field of reliability. My father was one of the pioneers of reliability in the 1950’s when nobody even knew what reliability really was. He pioneered and championed technologies like vibration analysis, infrared thermography and many others working for a Fortune 100 chemical company. Later he focused his attention on the cultural aspects of reliability and how organizations need to behave to make it all work.
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A month ago, I received a question, “Why the castles for the artwork?” It was not the first time someone wondered why we use line drawings of old stone building features or sketches of castle layouts. It is safe to say it was and remains a purposeful artwork selection to promote community around Accendo Reliability.
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Have you ever heard of a communication system? You likely have, but you’ve probably not considered what that means. The good news for most of us is that communication is indeed a system. Even better, as technical professionals, we are blessed with the reality of what that means. The next time you serve as a trusted advisor, remember that effective communication requires systems thinking.
A system is a collection of interrelated or interacting parts, each of which can affect the behavior or outcomes of the whole. One defining property of a system is that it provides a function that none of the parts can accomplish by themselves. The corollary is that a system is not the sum of the parts but the product of their interactions.
Simple examples include the mechanical advantage gained from a system of pulleys or a gearbox. Sports teams or work units are examples of human systems. Systems are essential aspects of our everyday lives.
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In any organization, effective leadership is crucial to driving success and achieving goals. However, one often overlooked aspect of leadership is the role fear plays in an organization. Fear and its negative effects are present in every organization but rarely identified or measured. And when employees are afraid, they are less likely to take risks, share ideas, or give clear, honest assessments of risk. In this first article of a 3-part series, I’ll share the general effects that fear can have on your organization. And in the follow-up articles, I’ll share what can be done to identify, measure and mitigate these fears. In the end, employee fears stifles innovation, hampers collaboration, limits growth and prevents continuous improvement as detailed below.
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Suppliers and users of any product want that it performs well during its lifetime. That is, the item must perform within specified operating parameters during its life cycle. The life cycle of an item comprises Concept, Research & Development, Production, Operation & Maintenance and, Disposal phases. Each phase carry costs its owner wishes to minimize. The idea is to realize the most value from the item when the whole life cycle costs and benefits are considered. In most cases, usually 80% of the total costs are incurred during the operation & maintenance phase of the life cycle. Machine failures cause plants to stop production causing accidents, economic impacts and reputation loses. Asset components gradual degradation with age, operational/maintenance errors and design flaws all can cause assets or processes to fail. A failed asset is considered unreliable, which means that it is no longer able to fulfill its intended function.
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The very best monitoring and measuring analysis you can do for your company’s maintenance success is to develop the distribution curves of your range of maintenance KPI’s.
At least they will be useful in the honest decision-making you need to do to continually become a better and better maintenance performer.
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“Water water everywhere, not a drop to drink” is the modern and well-known phraseology from the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s 1798 poem “The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner”. In essence this means that despite being surrounded by an abundance of something one cannot benefit from it.
In today’s Information Age we are surrounded by data. It’s everywhere and often available at the touch of a button, or rather a screen. Instant and easy access is demanded but despite computers and the internet the right data is not always so easily or readily found. Data, and the right data is an essential ingredient for decision making.
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In the intricate web of industrial operations, maintenance, repairs, and operations (MRO) process development stands as the unsung hero, optimizing workflows, minimizing downtime, and ensuring the seamless continuity of production. It’s a craft that requires precision, strategic planning, and a knack for efficiency. Let’s embark on a journey to uncover the art of MRO process development and why it’s the lynchpin of high-quality operations.
[Read more…]Key Teaching Principle # 1 is the instructor demonstrates a solid understanding of fundamentals, speaking directly to students, and not reading slides.
“Human behavior flows from three main sources: desire, emotion, and knowledge.” Plato
“Life calls not for perfection, but for completeness.” Carl Jung
One of the common FMEA questions that comes up is: When is an FMEA complete? You’d think it would be simple, but many organizations and practitioners get it wrong.
In this article, I’ll begin with the purpose of Design and Process FMEAs, and from there, we’ll examine two very different approaches to completing an FMEA.
Let’s think of this as a crowdsourced project. The first version of this book is a compilation of NoMTBF.com articles. It lays out why we do not want to use MTBF and what to do instead (to some extent).
With your input on success stories, how to make progress using better metrics, and input of examples, stories, case studies, etc., the next version of the book will be much better and much more practical.
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Welcome to the realm where reliability engineering meets product design—a landscape where innovation thrives on understanding and addressing customer pain points. In this guide, we will explore the intricate dance of empathy within the design thinking process, offering engineers and designers a roadmap to navigate the complexities of customer-centric problem-solving.
At the heart of the design thinking process lies the empathize phase—a journey that begins with a courageous act: wiping the slate clean of preconceived notions and biases. For seasoned professionals, this is akin to stepping into the unknown. Design thinking demands a reset—a departure from the comfort of accumulated solutions and a return to the essence of the problem.
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California senators introduced a new bill on pipeline safety – The Strengthening Pipeline Safety and Enforcement Act of 2011. A few key elements in the proposed legislature are:
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