Reliability is all about getting out
in front of your equipment, under-
standing its failure modes and
stopping them from happening. A
lot of elements cause equipment failure, and
because of this, about 90 percent of failures
happen randomly. You can try to prevent
failure by changing your parts before they fail;
this works 12-18 percent of the time. You can
attempt to predict their failure, but this is only
50 percent accurate. To achieve reliability, you
need to be proactive.
Although equipment fails for a lot of
reasons, they all fall into one of three major
categories: improper lubrication, contamina-
tion and incorrect installation. Of these three,
lubrication, or better said, improper lubrication
is the most prominent.
Improper Lubrication
Improper lubrication drives mechanical
wear and corrosion, which leads to prema-
ture failure of your lubricated assets. If your
organization does nothing else to improve
reliability, you should address lubrication.
It offers the biggest bang for your buck and
can be implemented relatively cost effectively
COVER STORY
3 CAUSES OF
UNRELIABLE
EQUIPMENT
AND HOW TO ELIMINATE THEM
By Dr. Nathan C. Wright
8
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July - August 2018
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www
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machinerylubrication.com
