Machinery Lubrication magazine published by Noria Corporation
Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/1316458
www . machinerylubrication.com | November - December 2020 | 23 expressions like "best practice" or "precision lubrication." is means not all machines and not all condition monitoring tasks should be treated the same. Many decisions are driven (or should be) by funda- mental concepts derived from criticality analysis and Failure Modes Effects Analysis (FMEA). From real awareness gained from these two analyses, we can move from guessing to decisions made with greater confidence and certainty. When machines are viewed in the context of criticality and failure modes, the decision of whether to include them in a lubricant anal- ysis program becomes abundantly clear. is is Machinery Selection Factor (A1P) related to inspection tasks, oil analysis, ultrasound and many other condition monitoring activities. ere are a number of Lubricant Analysis Data Source options too, such as online monitoring, portable instruments, onsite labs, remote labs and numerous mixtures and variations. is is addressed in Factor A3P. Once a machine has been included in an oil analysis, inspection and condition monitoring program there is a need to know the Lubricant Test Slate for routine and exception samples. is is the objective of Factor A2P. Condition monitoring must be strategic and intentional. is is a bit of an engineering exercise starting with FMEA. Basically, every highly-ranked failure mode needs to have one or most more lubri- cant tests, inspections and other condition monitoring tasks assigned to it for early detection and remediation. After all, that's the essence of condition-based maintenance: to detect active failure modes before they become advanced and precipitous failure modes. e last Platform level factor in this lifecycle is Sampling Tools and Methods (A4P). To some, this may seem trivial in importance compared to other factors. However, lubricant analysis is constructed from an integrity chain. e strength of the chain is no greater than the strength of the weakest link. So, what is the most common weakest link? It's the sampling process; where, how, when, what tools, etc. e user organization is totally responsible for this step which is the equivalent to laboratory raw material. e finished goods (data) from oil analysis process can be no better the quality and timeliness of the sample supplied to the lab. Management and Training Level Factors At the Management and Training level there is a need to Select and Integrate Inspection and Condition Monitoring Tasks (A5M). is both unifies and opti- mizes the condition monitoring program. Data should converge to establish a recognizable and accurate picture of the state of lubricants and machines. Don't expect that all the data needed can be available from a single bottle of oil. Condition monitoring activities should all work towards a common goal. Without a doubt, inspection is a powerful and central part of condi- tion monitoring. When well-designed and executed, perhaps 75% of all on-condition work orders are the direct results of motivated, inquis- itive and skillful inspectors. To some, inspection might be viewed as somewhat archaic or pedestrian. But the reality is quite the opposite. Inspections deploy human sensors for which modern technology has no better substitute. Most importantly it leverages the supercomputer in the brain of every human data collector. is is the concept of Inspection 2.0 discussed extensively in Noria training courses and on the pages of Machinery Lubrication magazine. It takes the old concepts of inspection and recalibrates them in the context of today's reliability and condition monitoring culture. It puts emphasis in on examination skills and periodicity. See Figure 1. You could say that inspection provides the eyes and ears for every- thing that condition monitoring can't detect and is a default detection scheme during the intervening days when no technology-based condi- tion monitoring occurs. In other words, inspection fills in critical gaps where there is detection blindness of the technologies and schedule blindness for the time periods between use. Higher inspection frequency and more intense examination skills (by the inspector) significantly increase condition monitoring's ability to detect root causes and symp- toms of various states of failure. e following are a few core elements related to Inspection 2.0: • Operator-driven. With Inspection 2.0, operators accept serious ownership in machine reliability. is is very similar to Total Productive Maintenance, that stresses the maintenance and reli- ability is everyone's responsibility. • Examination Skills. Condition-based Maintenance (CBM) requires the continuous awareness of the meaningful conditions given off by the machine. It doesn't care how these conditions become known or understood. Hence, there is a basic need to condition awareness regardless of how this information is discov- ered, i.e., by inspection or technology-based methods. ML Figure 1: How value can be translated from skillful and frequent inspections.