Accendo Reliability

Your Reliability Engineering Professional Development Site

Home » Blog

by Leave a Comment

The Fortune 500 and a Deceptive Communication Practice

The Fortune 500 and a Deceptive Communication Practice

Using shapes as a deceptive communication practice is an old trick used for manipulation by one side of an argument. The good news is that Fortune gets it right in its annual publication of Fortune 500 companies. Fortune correctly uses two-dimensional shapes (circles) to depict one-dimensional values such as annual revenues. We’ll discuss this data visualization trick in this brief article.

The Trick

Suppose your total revenues were $100 per month, and your leading competitor had total revenues of $10 per month. Clearly, you are ten times stronger from a total revenue perspective from your competitor. A one-dimensional graph, such as a bar chart, makes an honest visual representation of the difference.

[Read more…]

by Leave a Comment

Is Everything in Order?

Is Everything in Order?

Hopefully, you have already seen that utilizing R for engineering can unlock a host of powerful tools and techniques and give you the power of data visualization.

In using R, you will likely work with various objects (data files, scripts, analyses, reports etc.). As with other things, creating structure for how you accomplish things in R can be important for both effectiveness and efficiency.

[Read more…]

by Leave a Comment

Understanding Anomaly Detection (AD) with the P-F Curve

Understanding Anomaly Detection (AD) with the P-F Curve

In the previous article, P-F Curve was used to understand the Remaining useful life (RUL) of an asset. RUL can be estimated at any time during the asset’s life, but it’s opportune to calculate RUL at the time ‘t’ when the asset shows signs of an impending failure. In the P-F Curve terminology the point at which the asset shows signs of failure is called the Potential Failure Point (Pf), which can also be stated as the time of anomalous behavior. The exercise of detecting anomalous behavior is called “Anomaly Detection (AD)”.

[Read more…]

by Leave a Comment

The Value of Precision Quality Standards

The Value of Precision Quality Standards

When equipment working parts are operated within their precision quality standard zones, world-class reliability is guaranteed.

The figures below demonstrates the importance of setting precision quality standards to achieve outstanding equipment reliability. It comes from a conference presentation on the production equipment reliability improvement in a steel mill in Australia.

[Read more…]

by Leave a Comment

Evaluating Your Risk Management Framework

Evaluating Your Risk Management Framework

Guest Post by Peter Holtmann (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

This article is the sixth of fourteen parts to our risk management series. The series will be taking a look at the risk management guidelines under the ISO 31000 Standard to help you better understand them and how they relate to your own risk management activities. In doing so, we’ll be walking through the core aspects of the Standard and giving you practical guidance on how to implement it.

In previous articles we’ve looked at the core elements of the risk management framework, as well as the role of leadership and commitment, integration, design and implementation more specifically. In this article, we’ll be looking at how to effectively evaluate your organisation’s risk management framework.

[Read more…]

by Leave a Comment

Understanding Remaining Useful Life (RUL) with the P-F Curve

Understanding Remaining Useful Life (RUL) with the P-F Curve

Recently, there has been an influx of Industry 4.0 companies promising their product/application would help predict the Remaining Useful Life (RUL) of a physical asset. Each uses a mix of machine learning algorithms to estimate the RUL based on the data available. This is their value proposition. But what is this ‘life’?

[Read more…]

by Leave a Comment

Future of Project Management Profession

Future of Project Management Profession

Guest Post by John Ayers (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

What does the future of any profession mean? Underdetermined future events (e.eg. COVID-19)? Future proof job? Work /family balance? Health at a later date? Secure retirement?  It is all of the above and that is why you need to choose the right profession for you.

The future of the project management profession is bright and strong for a long time to come.

[Read more…]

by Leave a Comment

Enhancing Component Reliability with Nondestructive Testing Technologies

Enhancing Component Reliability with Nondestructive Testing Technologies

In the world of reliability engineering, ensuring the long-term dependability and safety of components is of paramount importance. Nondestructive Testing (NDT) technologies have emerged as indispensable tools for reliability professionals in various industries, including aerospace, automotive, manufacturing, and power generation. By enabling the inspection and evaluation of materials and components without causing damage, NDT techniques play a crucial role in enhancing short and long-term reliability. 

In this blog post, we will explore several NDT technologies and how they contribute to improving component reliability.

[Read more…]

by Leave a Comment

Maintaining Equipment Reliability Amidst Frequent Employee Turnover

Maintaining Equipment Reliability Amidst Frequent Employee Turnover

The mining industry in Australia has for some time been plagued by high turnover in its skilled maintenance workforce. The tough lifestyle and remote/regional locations are some of the main contributing causes, and have been for years, however other industries of employment offering competitive wages and a better lifestyle have in the recent years pulled the workforce from mining, leaving a void of labor numbers behind that have proved difficult to fill.

The common query, “How do I keep equipment reliability up, even with high turnover?” prompts a standardized response from most maintenance professionals – proceduralize the maintenance system to reduce variability and maintain consistent output. However, while this approach bears truth, it overlooks a substantial aspect…

[Read more…]

by Leave a Comment

1770-1806 The Battle of Trafalgar and the Timber Crisis

1770-1806 The Battle of Trafalgar and the Timber Crisis

Ships Don’t Last Like They Used To

Robert G. Albion was a notable historian of maritime affairs. He taught at Princeton and Harvard, and was one of the US Navy’s chief historians during World War II. In one of his books, Albion examined how timber management in Britain affected naval shipbuilding and maintenance policies.

In the late 1700s, the British Empire was more dependent on the navy for power projection, home defense, and security of maritime trade. In the age of sail, the average ship life was between 10 and 20 years. In the 17th century, British naval ships lasted 25-30 years. Albion found their average service life to be only 13 years in 1771. By 1792, service life fell to 12 years. In the Napoleonic period, the lifespan fell to only 8 years.  

“The ‘life’ or duration of a ship was reckoned from the date of her launching to the time when her condition necessitated repairs as costly as the construction of a new ship.” The British determined service life by a basic level of repair analysis.

[Read more…]

by 2 Comments

The “Bath Tub” Curve Explained

The “Bath Tub” Curve Explained

Introducing the “Bath Tub” curve concept

In the Reliability and Maintenance world, we often refer to what is known as the “bathtub” curve and ask the question: “What is the bathtub curve for this equipment?” The name “bathtub” comes from the equipment failure rate curve resembling a sanitary bathtub’s longitudinal section. In reality, it is rarely symmetrical and looks more like a distorted “u” or “v” shaped figure. The bathtub curve can be useful in various circumstances and help an operator better manage their assets over time. However, it is important to understand where it comes from and what it means so we can avoid misusing or misinterpreting it.

[Read more…]