Your Reliability Engineering Professional Development Site
Steel forging holds significant importance in developed economies around the world. It is used to shape raw materials into precisely designed components that often have critical performance requirements. Due to their strength, durability, and reliability in harsh environments, forged steel components are utilized in a wide range of industries including aerospace, automotive, defense, and construction.
[Read more…]
A month ago, I wrote about fire in a biodiesel facility – the last one for 2010.
Four days into 2011, a fire was reported at a biodiesel plant in Indiana. A boiler used to heat oil which in turn in used to warm biodiesel caught on fire.
Overhauling equipment is expected to bring it to an “as good as new” state. But is this really the case in reality? Equipment will deteriorate over time and progressively lose its ability to function. No matter how extensive the overhaul, the equipment will unlikely be up to the level of “newness” as when it rolled out of the assembly line. Sure, if you have this vintage automobile from the 1930s, and spend an absolute fortune on its overhaul, it might come close to being new again. But somewhere in the structure of this automobile, there will an element that is “as good as old” and vulnerable to imminent failure. Also remember that this vintage automobile is not out there generating revenue. There is no accountant running after you with regards to budget constraints or revenue increases. Where there is passion, cost might not matter.
[Read more…]The bathtub curve is one of the most famous graphical representations in reliability. It shows the typical trend of failure rate over time (Figure 1). This curve can be divided into three parts corresponding to decreasing, constant and increasing failure rate.
High but decreasing failure rate in the first part of the curve (1) indicates products defective or prone to fail due to manufacturing or design issues. The middle section (2) is characterized by low and constant failure rate. Failures in this phase are caused by unpredictable external events like flatting tire or power surge causing electronic failures. The right-hand side of the bathtub curve (3) shows increasing failure rate. In this stage, failures occur due to wear-out damage mechanisms such as fatigue, creep, ageing, wear and corrosion.
[Read more…]
A risk management risk matrix can trick you into leaving high consequences uncontrolled and convince you it is fine to do nothing to reduce the impacts of failure. Whether you think a bad event cannot happen has no standing in Law. The likelihood of an adverse event is unimportant; only the resultant severity is how the Law will gauge your risk abatement efforts. Did you do ‘reasonably practicable’ risk control?
[Read more…]
Job safety has come a long way in 50 years since the Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSH Act) was enacted. The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) says “more than 627,000 workers now can say their lives have been saved since the passage of the OSH Act.”
But the journey is ongoing and there’s much farther to go in eliminating death and injuries on the job.
[Read more…]
False. Nearly all organizations do not have adequate historical data found in databases to successfully carry out an RCM analysis.
[Read more…]
NTSB has issued seven safety recommendations following the September, 2010 San Bruno incident in California.
[Read more…]
Accelerated life tests are used to help predict the rate of failure of components. Capacitors are frequent victims of accelerated life testing, and have a distant relationship with one of the earliest documented accelerated life tests: the unit of capacitance, the farad, is named for Sir Michael Faraday.
Michael Faraday remains one of the most important scientists of all time. He made foundational discoveries in electricity, magnetism, and electrochemistry. Today, Faraday is less well known for documenting the Royal Navy’s results of accelerated life tests on dry rot of wood.
[Read more…]
Readability formulas determine how easily a specific audience can understand a text. There are more than a dozen readability formulas, such as Flesch Reading Ease, the Flesch-Kincaid Grade Level, the Simple Measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG), the Gunning-FOG Index, and the Coleman-Liau Index. Many Google, Microsoft, and Adobe products have a built-in readability formula. Editing tools such as Grammarly do, too. The one big thing to remember is that too much attention to readability scores does not mean your writing is easier to comprehend or understand.
Most readability formulas use some combination of sentence length, the average number of words per sentence, the average number of characters per word, or the number of words with three or more syllables. You can use the formulas to score text by hand. The results from these formulas are often given as a grade level, such as “4th grade” or “12th grade.”
[Read more…]
The Plant and Equipment Wellness Way was designed to quickly create Operational Excellence success. You can only get the Plant Wellness Way from LRS Operational Excellence Consultants.
[Read more…]
Managing assets to make them deliver the products and services we need now and in the future is the essential purpose of Asset Management. However, Asset Management is more about obtaining value from assets than what you do to the assets. It is about utilizing assets to deliver value to your organization while attaining corporate goals. Human capital is an essential element of the whole asset management process from strategy to operation.
[Read more…]
The 21st century, was an era of unprecedented global integration. During this period, the U.S. became heavily dependent on China for providing low-cost goods to help low and medium waged Americans to make ends meet. COVID-19 unveiled a very serious weakness in the U.S. supply chain with China that was unknown to the general public and most of the legislature.
More than 85% of all imports for N-95 masks, respirators, disposable; and non-disposable face masks, surgical drapes, and surgical towels come from China. As an example, global trade in medical masks used by doctors and nurses grew from $900 million in January to $9.2 billion in May. China was the source of 92% of the U.S. imports.
How can we mitigate China’s supply chain risk? This paper presents a strategy to consider in achieving this goal.
Credibility, often described as the currency of trust, is a quality that sets the foundation for professional success. It’s the attribute that influences how others perceive your competence, reliability, and integrity. Whether you’re an individual striving to advance your career or a business aiming to gain the trust of your clients, credibility is your guiding star. In this blog, we’ll delve into the methods of developing and enhancing credibility to help you stand out in your professional journey.
[Read more…]“I never teach my pupils. I only attempt to provide the conditions in which they can learn.” Albert Einstein
Reliability engineers, FMEA team leaders, and other quality and reliability professionals are often called upon to teach the principles of reliability or FMEA. This article is the beginning of a new series called “The principles of effective teaching.”
If you want to convey knowledge to another person, you are teaching. If you want to learn from another person who is teaching, you will benefit from learning these principles.
