Have you had a chance to check out the latest edition of the AMMJ? If not take a look, the March 2012 edition has a survey looking a different CMMS systems. Check out the MainitMizer™ survey which begins on page 37!
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Friday, March 23, 2012
Reliability Excellence and the Planner/Scheduler Function
Check out the article below from ReliabilityWeb.com, happy reading!
Reliability Excellence and the Planner/Scheduler Function
by Life Cycle Engineering
Reliability Excellence and the Planner/Scheduler Function
by Life Cycle Engineering
Manufacturing and Facility maintenance organizations everywhere struggle with the challenge of providing operational capacity for their company or organization. Maintenance strives to accomplish this by increasing the reliability of the equipment or process through effective Preventive Maintenance and effective material and labor budget utilization.
An excellent method for enabling these efforts is through effective planning and scheduling. Qualified Planner/Schedulers in a proactive, mature, structured, and disciplined maintenance organization can greatly impact the success of meeting these challenges. It has been stated and well documented by many companies that every hour of effective planning pays back three to five hours in maintenance technician time saved or the equivalent savings in materials and/or operational downtime.
However, many maintenance organizations fail to realize this payback from their planner groups. Why is this so? There are many contributing factors to this. The first is the lack of support from the entire organization to the role of planning and scheduling. This lack of support can be manifested in various ways.
- Planning and scheduling is not accepted as one of the three core functions of maintenance.
- The planning and scheduling function is too low in the maintenance organization resulting in little support when key decisions are required.
- The role is not staffed as a management position, and compensation is just above that of a day shift maintenance technician.
- The planner function is viewed as a fill-in position for supervisors or when additional maintenance labor is needed for peak times or shutdowns.
- The planner function is used as a parts expediter, an emergency procurement gofer.
- Any other responsibility management doesn’t have a clear fit for.
In order for planning groups to be effective, contribute to the overall success, and impact capacity, the role and importance of the planning function has to be communicated and supported by the management.
The second factor is the quality/caliber of the individual performing the planner/scheduler function. The person has to have the technical background of maintenance and a proactive maintenance mind set. Reactive, “fire fighter”, “drop everything to save the day” attitudes do not work in an effective planning group. True planner/schedulers work in the “Next Week” and beyond time frame. Effective planners are passionate for their role as well as structured and methodical in their thought and work processes. The selection process for the right planner/scheduler should be as detailed and comprehensive as for any managerial position. The selection should not be solely by seniority and definitely not a dumping spot for someone that doesn’t fit anywhere else in the organization.
The third factor is the type and amount of training planner/schedulers receive. Newly hired planners that have met the basic requirements of the position can become unmotivated quickly if left to fend for themselves. Bad habits and work practices will become part of their routines as well. Training on the roles and responsibilities of planners, the CMMS, purchase requisitions, and workflow have to be conducted as part of new planner orientation. Instilling “Best Practices” in each area is essential to the success of the planner group. Continuing education and training is required in order to maintain proficiencies in their technical/trade backgrounds as well as staying up to date on latest technology to support the organization.
As maintenance organizations evaluate their ability to provide the operational capacity, they should not fail to evaluate how well the planning function is being supported. Do they have the full support and commitment to focus specifically on planning and scheduling? Are the planner/schedulers the best qualified for the position, and are they sufficiently trained to perform their jobs effectively and efficiently?
How well is your planner/scheduler group functioning?
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Using Effective Labels and Visuals to Enhance Asset Performance
This article is available at ReliabilityWeb.com and was written by Chris Rutter. We hope you see as much value in it as we did! Enjoy!
Enhance Asset Performance with Effective Labels and Visuals
Visual devices are widely used in 5S, Standard Work, Quick Changeover, Kanban, and other lean techniques, but they should also be an important component of your proactive maintenance strategy.
When implemented correctly, visuals can provide a number of benefits to your reliability program, including:- Simplified preventive maintenance
- Optimized predictive maintenance
- Faster troubleshooting and repairs
- Improved quality, with fewer errors and defects
Simplify Preventive Maintenance
Signs and labels can be used to identify preventive maintenance (PM) points and provide basic cleaning, inspection, and lubrication instructions.
These visuals are especially important if your company has implemented an autonomous maintenance program. When responsibilities for routine care and inspection are transferred to equipment operators instead of trained maintenance professionals, it becomes critical to clearly define their tasks and checkpoints.
For example, improper lubrication - too little or too much - is a major cause of equipment failure. A simple lube label can save your company significant costs in motor repair and replacement.
In addition, color-coded markings can be applied to zerk fittings and grease guns to guard against using the wrong type of lubrication.
Oil level indicators can also be applied to sight tubes to simplify oil management. The use of green and red striped labels placed behind the sight tube lets the operator easily detect when oil levels are too high or too low.
Preventive maintenance schedules and check sheets are other valuable visuals to have on your shop floor. These schedules show who needs to perform what task and when the task should be completed.
A schedule should simply highlight the task to be performed; it should not list the steps taken to accomplish it. If step-by-step instructions are required for the task, those details should be made available on a separate procedure.
Optimize Predictive Maintenance
As baby boomers retire - about 78 million in the next 10 to 15 years - there will be a growing number of new and relatively inexperienced technicians in the workforce. One large, well-known manufacturer recently forecasted that by 2014, approximately 70 percent of its maintenance staff will have less than five years of relevant job experience.
This will greatly increase the risk of errors and omissions in maintenance activities.
In addition, maintenance workers must learn how to use a growing number of sophisticated predictive maintenance technologies, such as vibration analysis, ultrasound, and thermal imaging. When performing predictive maintenance, it’s critical to take measurements at the same exact place each time. To ensure that the location for readings remains consistent - regardless of who conducts the inspection - you can apply predictive maintenance targets.
When implementing predictive maintenance programs, reliability technicians often use inspection routes to streamline the process and maximize efficiency. The drawback to this approach, however, is that the technician may not be familiar with each and every piece of equipment, and the proper readouts may vary across different machines.
Visual controls like gauge labels make it clear to anyone at a glance whether the temperature or pressure is within the normal operating range. In fact, these visuals make it so easy to detect abnormalities that anyone walking by becomes a potential inspector, facilitating early detection of potential problems.
Visuals can also be used to detect when chain tension is too loose, or advise when to replace the chain. When tension slackens, links from the chain should be removed, and the adjustment block can be shifted to restore proper tension with the shorter chain. Once a specified number of links have been removed, the edge of the block extends outside of the green area, clearly indicating that the chain should be replaced.
Faster Troubleshooting and Repair
Visuals can also speed troubleshooting and repairs. Including “to” and “from” information on equipment ID labels makes it easier to trace lines in electrical systems and pipe networks. As a result, you can perform repairs faster and reduce the risk of errors and potential injury.
Maintenance stores are perhaps the biggest contributor to maintenance inefficiencies, and your storeroom may offer plenty of opportunities for improvement through visual management. You can make repairs even more efficient by ensuring that the proper replacement part and its storage location are clearly identified, ideally by putting the information right at the point of need as shown.
To reduce search time, and ultimately reduce downtime, clearly label shelves and bins in stock rooms and tool cribs. Where possible, use graphics and/or photos on your labels for faster recognition and to avoid pulling the wrong part.
To enhance safety and reduce hazards, many companies are posting graphical lockout procedures right on or next to their equipment. These procedures provide the detailed steps included in accomplishing a task, including photos, diagrams, and instructions.
All procedures should include the content, or what you do; the sequence, or the order in which you do it; the time, or the time it takes to do it or how frequently it should be done; and the objective, or the desired outcome.
Be sure to keep your procedures simple. For example, don’t mix operator tasks with maintenance technician tasks. The most effective procedures are designed specifically for one type of user.
Posting hazard warnings and procedures with safe work instructions right at the point of need is the most effective way to reduce accidents and injuries at your plant. These procedures are as important (if not more so) than classroom or computer-based safety training.
Promote Error-Free Setup
When restoring equipment to operation, how can you ensure efficient and error-free setup? Visuals such as the operator control panel labels and alignment aids shown below help to simplify machine settings and positioning.
In addition, labeling the rotational direction on gears and shafts can help you avoid costly setup errors that can damage or destroy motors and drive systems.
Make Your Own Visuals
All of the visuals referenced in this article can be created right from your facility using a lean tools software system and industrial lean label printers. With a versatile in-house labeling system, you can create your own industrial-grade visuals on site and on demand, at a fraction of the cost of having them printed by an outside vendor.
Today’s lean software uses template wizards to speed and simplify the design and layout of custom visuals. The software includes thousands of safety and industrial pictograms, and it even lets you import your own logos or photos. You can also import data from spreadsheets and databases to include on your labels.
Industrial printers are available that can print multiple colors without manual ribbon changes and can even print photographic images. These printers output to a wide variety of media, including permanent and repositionable adhesive labels, tags and Kanban cards, magnets, and more.
If you purchase a printer with a built-in plotter cutter, you can easily create cut-letter door signs and paint stencils. All these capabilities are available in a make-it-yourself visual workplace printing system for use in lean and world-class manufacturing environments.
As you look to improve equipment performance and reliability, it pays to keep your eyes open for new ways in which visual systems can benefit your overall lean initiatives.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
American Manufacturing Decline
We recently ran across this article published on Information Technology Innovation Foundation's website. Based in Michigan, we have seen the decline in manufacturing both in our backyard and through our clients. Whether you take a moment to read the summary below or the entire article, we hope you find it as interesting as we did. Our hats go off to the Manufacturing Industry, we know how hard you work and how important you are to the overall health of our economy.
Worse Than the Great Depression: What the Experts Are Missing About American Manufacturing Decline: Executive Summary
In the 2000s, U.S. manufacturing suffered its worst performance in American history in terms of jobs. Not only did America lose 5.7 million manufacturing jobs, but the decline as a share of total manufacturing jobs (33 percent) exceeded the rate of loss in the Great Depression.1 Despite this unprecedented negative performance, most economists, pundits and elected officials remain remarkably blasé about what has transpired. Manufacturing, they argue, has simply become incredibly productive. While tough on workers who are laid off, outsized job losses actually indicate superior performance. All that might be needed are better programs to help laid-off production workers. And there is certainly no need for a determined national manufacturing competitiveness strategy.
The alarm bells are largely silent for two reasons. First, most economists and pundits do not extend their analysis beyond one macro-level number—change in real manufacturing value-added relative to real GDP—which at first glance appears stable. But this number masks real decline in many industries. In 2010, 13 of the 19 U.S. manufacturing sectors (employing 55 percent of manufacturing workers) were producing less than in 2000.2
Second, and more fundamentally, U.S. government statistics significantly overstate the change in U.S. manufacturing output, and by definition productivity, in part because of massive overestimation of output growth in the computer and electronics sector and because of problems with how manufacturing imports are measured. When measured properly, U.S. manufacturing output actually fell 11 percent over the last decade while GDP increased 17 percent, something that has not happened before, at least since WWII.
Moreover, manufacturing productivity grew by just 32 percent, not the reported healthy number of 72 percent indicated by Bureau of Economic Analysis data.3 If productivity growth was actually 72 percent, one would expect that U.S. manufacturers would have added plenty of machines and factories over the last decade to be more productive, as they have done every decade since WWII. In fact, total U.S. manufacturing capital stock increased just 2 percent, compared to historic rates of growth of between 20 and 50 percent per decade.
Thus, while superior productivity increases played some role in declining manufacturing employment, the overriding factor was output decline, highlighted by a striking result: if from 2000 to 2010 manufacturing output had grown at the same rate as that of the rest of the business sector, the United States would have 3.8 million more manufacturing jobs today and at least another four to six million jobs from the multiplier effect. What so many pundits miss is the centrality of manufacturing (and other globally traded sectors like the conventional wisdom that U.S. manufacturing job loss is simply a result of productivity-driven restructuring (akin to how U.S. agriculture lost jobs but is still healthy) is fundamentally flawed software) to U.S. economic health. In a comparison of 10 nations, including the United States there is a strong (0.57) correlation between change in manufacturing employment between 1987 and 2005 and total economy-wide employment growth from 2005 to 2010.4
As such, the conventional wisdom that U.S. manufacturing job loss is simply a result of productivity-driven restructuring (akin to how U.S. agriculture lost jobs but is still healthy) is fundamentally flawed. U.S. manufacturing lost jobs because manufacturing lost output, and it lost output because its ability to compete in global markets—some manipulated by egregious foreign mercantilist policies, others supported by better national competitiveness policies, including much lower corporate tax rates—declined significantly.
Even if experts acknowledge that manufacturing’s share of output has declined, many comfort themselves with a narrative that such decline is inevitable. “Manufacturing is in decline everywhere, even in China,” they argue. They would be wise to consult actual data, for they would find that while manufacturing has declined as a share of GDP in some nations (notably Canada, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States), it is stable or growing in many others (including Austria, China, Finland, Germany, Japan, Korea, the Netherlands, and Sweden). The loss of U.S. manufacturing is not due to some inexorable shift to a post-industrial economy; it is due to a failure of U.S. policies (for example, underinvestment in manufacturing technology support policies and a corporate tax rate that is increasingly uncompetitive) and the expansion of other nations’ mercantilist policies.5
Some go so far as to assert that manufacturing industries are “old economy” and that it is a reflection of failure, not success, if a country has a manufacturing sector that is either stable or growing. Perhaps they are thinking of the kind of factory represented in old movies, television shows, or news clips: dirty, clunky, mechanical havens filled with low- and moderate-skilled workers producing commodity products. They would be well-advised to visit the clean, streamlined, IT-driven manufacturing facilities operating in the United States today. The new facilities use advanced technologies and employ moderate- and high-skilled workers to turn out advanced products, from jet aircraft, computers and semiconductors, and advanced instruments and vehicles, to sophisticated chemical and biological compounds.
Others now argue that because a few manufacturing jobs have returned that the United States is poised for a manufacturing renaissance. But the rebound looks as good as it does only because the prior loss was so steep. The United States lost two million manufacturing jobs during the Great Recession, and since then a little over 166,000, or 8.2 percent, have returned. At the rate of growth in manufacturing jobs in 2011, it would take until 2020 to return to where the economy was in terms of manufacturing jobs at the end of 2007.6
So much of the debate and rhetoric around U.S. manufacturing is erroneous, precisely because the core data on manufacturing output and productivity are so flawed. It is time for this debate to be informed by accurate data and thorough analysis. We need to arrive at a point where anytime someone asserts that the loss of manufacturing jobs is due principally to superior productivity growth, the statement is challenged as inaccurate. And
THE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY & INNOVATION FOUNDATION | MARCH 2012
likewise with statements like, “since we have lost so many manufacturing jobs, it proves that it is no longer an important industry”.7 The reality is:
1. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Current Employment Statistics (manufacturing employment, seasonally adjusted; accessed March 14, 2012), http://www.bls.gov/ces/; Census Bureau, Statistical Abstract of the United States: 1941(Washington, D.C.: 1942), http://www.census.gov/prod/www/abs/statab1901-1950.htm. Jobs figures are for January 2000 to December 2010, and 1929 to 1933. From 1929 to 1933, U.S manufacturing employment fell by 31 percent.
2. Bureau of Economic Analysis, Gross Domestic Product by Industry Accounts (real value-added by industry, value-added by industry; accessed March 3, 2012), http://www.bea.gov/iTable/index_industry.cfm.
3 This 72 percent figure uses updated Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) value-added numbers. The official Bureau of Labor Statistics value-added productivity figures have not yet been updated with the new BEA data, and thus 2000-2010 manufacturing labor productivity growth is currently reported as 66 percent.
4 Bureau of Labor Statistics, Division of International Labor Comparisons, International Comparisons of Labor Force Statistics (Washington, D.C.: BLS, 2011), http://www.bls.gov/fls/flscomparelf/lfcompendium.pdf. Author’s analysis.
5. See Stephen Ezell and Robert D. Atkinson, “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of Innovation Policy” (Washington DC: ITIF, 2010), http://www.itif.org/publications/good-bad-and-ugly-innovation-policy.
6. Ibid.
7. Robert Reich, “Manufacturing Illusions,” HuffPost Business (blog), February 17, 2012, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/manufacturing-jobs_b_1285909.html.
8. Robert D. Atkinson and Stephen Ezell, “A Charter for Revitalizing American Manufacturing” (Washington, DC: ITIF, 2011), http://www.itif.org/publications/charter-revitalizing-american-manufacturing.
Worse Than the Great Depression: What the Experts Are Missing About American Manufacturing Decline: Executive Summary
In the 2000s, U.S. manufacturing suffered its worst performance in American history in terms of jobs. Not only did America lose 5.7 million manufacturing jobs, but the decline as a share of total manufacturing jobs (33 percent) exceeded the rate of loss in the Great Depression.1 Despite this unprecedented negative performance, most economists, pundits and elected officials remain remarkably blasé about what has transpired. Manufacturing, they argue, has simply become incredibly productive. While tough on workers who are laid off, outsized job losses actually indicate superior performance. All that might be needed are better programs to help laid-off production workers. And there is certainly no need for a determined national manufacturing competitiveness strategy.
The alarm bells are largely silent for two reasons. First, most economists and pundits do not extend their analysis beyond one macro-level number—change in real manufacturing value-added relative to real GDP—which at first glance appears stable. But this number masks real decline in many industries. In 2010, 13 of the 19 U.S. manufacturing sectors (employing 55 percent of manufacturing workers) were producing less than in 2000.2
Second, and more fundamentally, U.S. government statistics significantly overstate the change in U.S. manufacturing output, and by definition productivity, in part because of massive overestimation of output growth in the computer and electronics sector and because of problems with how manufacturing imports are measured. When measured properly, U.S. manufacturing output actually fell 11 percent over the last decade while GDP increased 17 percent, something that has not happened before, at least since WWII.
Moreover, manufacturing productivity grew by just 32 percent, not the reported healthy number of 72 percent indicated by Bureau of Economic Analysis data.3 If productivity growth was actually 72 percent, one would expect that U.S. manufacturers would have added plenty of machines and factories over the last decade to be more productive, as they have done every decade since WWII. In fact, total U.S. manufacturing capital stock increased just 2 percent, compared to historic rates of growth of between 20 and 50 percent per decade.
Thus, while superior productivity increases played some role in declining manufacturing employment, the overriding factor was output decline, highlighted by a striking result: if from 2000 to 2010 manufacturing output had grown at the same rate as that of the rest of the business sector, the United States would have 3.8 million more manufacturing jobs today and at least another four to six million jobs from the multiplier effect. What so many pundits miss is the centrality of manufacturing (and other globally traded sectors like the conventional wisdom that U.S. manufacturing job loss is simply a result of productivity-driven restructuring (akin to how U.S. agriculture lost jobs but is still healthy) is fundamentally flawed software) to U.S. economic health. In a comparison of 10 nations, including the United States there is a strong (0.57) correlation between change in manufacturing employment between 1987 and 2005 and total economy-wide employment growth from 2005 to 2010.4
As such, the conventional wisdom that U.S. manufacturing job loss is simply a result of productivity-driven restructuring (akin to how U.S. agriculture lost jobs but is still healthy) is fundamentally flawed. U.S. manufacturing lost jobs because manufacturing lost output, and it lost output because its ability to compete in global markets—some manipulated by egregious foreign mercantilist policies, others supported by better national competitiveness policies, including much lower corporate tax rates—declined significantly.
Even if experts acknowledge that manufacturing’s share of output has declined, many comfort themselves with a narrative that such decline is inevitable. “Manufacturing is in decline everywhere, even in China,” they argue. They would be wise to consult actual data, for they would find that while manufacturing has declined as a share of GDP in some nations (notably Canada, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States), it is stable or growing in many others (including Austria, China, Finland, Germany, Japan, Korea, the Netherlands, and Sweden). The loss of U.S. manufacturing is not due to some inexorable shift to a post-industrial economy; it is due to a failure of U.S. policies (for example, underinvestment in manufacturing technology support policies and a corporate tax rate that is increasingly uncompetitive) and the expansion of other nations’ mercantilist policies.5
Some go so far as to assert that manufacturing industries are “old economy” and that it is a reflection of failure, not success, if a country has a manufacturing sector that is either stable or growing. Perhaps they are thinking of the kind of factory represented in old movies, television shows, or news clips: dirty, clunky, mechanical havens filled with low- and moderate-skilled workers producing commodity products. They would be well-advised to visit the clean, streamlined, IT-driven manufacturing facilities operating in the United States today. The new facilities use advanced technologies and employ moderate- and high-skilled workers to turn out advanced products, from jet aircraft, computers and semiconductors, and advanced instruments and vehicles, to sophisticated chemical and biological compounds.
Others now argue that because a few manufacturing jobs have returned that the United States is poised for a manufacturing renaissance. But the rebound looks as good as it does only because the prior loss was so steep. The United States lost two million manufacturing jobs during the Great Recession, and since then a little over 166,000, or 8.2 percent, have returned. At the rate of growth in manufacturing jobs in 2011, it would take until 2020 to return to where the economy was in terms of manufacturing jobs at the end of 2007.6
So much of the debate and rhetoric around U.S. manufacturing is erroneous, precisely because the core data on manufacturing output and productivity are so flawed. It is time for this debate to be informed by accurate data and thorough analysis. We need to arrive at a point where anytime someone asserts that the loss of manufacturing jobs is due principally to superior productivity growth, the statement is challenged as inaccurate. And
THE INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY & INNOVATION FOUNDATION | MARCH 2012
likewise with statements like, “since we have lost so many manufacturing jobs, it proves that it is no longer an important industry”.7 The reality is:
- A large share of manufacturing jobs was lost in the last decade because the United States lost its competitive edge for manufacturing. It was due to a failure of U.S. policy, not superior productivity.
- The loss was cataclysmic and unprecedented, and it continues to severely impact the overall U.S. economy.
- Regaining U.S. manufacturing competitiveness to the point where America has balanced its trade in manufacturing products is critical to restoring U.S. economic vibrancy.
- Regaining manufacturing competitiveness will create millions of higher-than-average-wage manufacturing jobs, as well as an even greater number of jobs from the multiplier effect on other sectors of the economy.
- The United States can restore manufacturing competitiveness and balance manufacturing goods trade within less than a decade if it adopts the right set of policies in what can be termed the “four T’s” (tax, trade, talent, and technology).8
1. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Current Employment Statistics (manufacturing employment, seasonally adjusted; accessed March 14, 2012), http://www.bls.gov/ces/; Census Bureau, Statistical Abstract of the United States: 1941(Washington, D.C.: 1942), http://www.census.gov/prod/www/abs/statab1901-1950.htm. Jobs figures are for January 2000 to December 2010, and 1929 to 1933. From 1929 to 1933, U.S manufacturing employment fell by 31 percent.
2. Bureau of Economic Analysis, Gross Domestic Product by Industry Accounts (real value-added by industry, value-added by industry; accessed March 3, 2012), http://www.bea.gov/iTable/index_industry.cfm.
3 This 72 percent figure uses updated Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) value-added numbers. The official Bureau of Labor Statistics value-added productivity figures have not yet been updated with the new BEA data, and thus 2000-2010 manufacturing labor productivity growth is currently reported as 66 percent.
4 Bureau of Labor Statistics, Division of International Labor Comparisons, International Comparisons of Labor Force Statistics (Washington, D.C.: BLS, 2011), http://www.bls.gov/fls/flscomparelf/lfcompendium.pdf. Author’s analysis.
5. See Stephen Ezell and Robert D. Atkinson, “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly of Innovation Policy” (Washington DC: ITIF, 2010), http://www.itif.org/publications/good-bad-and-ugly-innovation-policy.
6. Ibid.
7. Robert Reich, “Manufacturing Illusions,” HuffPost Business (blog), February 17, 2012, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/manufacturing-jobs_b_1285909.html.
8. Robert D. Atkinson and Stephen Ezell, “A Charter for Revitalizing American Manufacturing” (Washington, DC: ITIF, 2011), http://www.itif.org/publications/charter-revitalizing-american-manufacturing.
Monday, March 19, 2012
Maintenance Best Practices -- Forward to the Basics with Grease Guns
By Jeff Shiver, Managing Principal, People and Processes Inc.
It may surprise you to learn that a grease gun is a deadly weapon capable of killing your equipment and in turn, the much-hoped-for reliability. Grease guns can generate significant pressure and if improperly used, ultimately blow out the seals designed to protect the bearings from external contaminants.
Overfilling the bearing cavities can create the same problem. When that occurs, the grease is forced outside the seals (path of least resistance) as the equipment heats up where it is exposed to contaminants and moisture. When the equipment cools, the contaminated grease is drawn back into those same cavities. Overfilling the cavities also creates additional heat.
So how can you overcome these problems? First, you need to understand the amount of grease required to properly lubricate the equipment. One of the best places to start is with the OEM or bearing manufacturer. Many manufacturers will provide you with the proper grease amounts to be applied at specific frequencies on electronic media like CD-ROMs.
Next, understand how much grease each of your grease guns provides per "shot" or pump. Samples from 30 different grease guns produced a range of 0.54 to 2.9 grams per pump. Pull samples to "calibrate" your grease guns and mark the amount of grease dispensed per pump on the gun itself.
To prevent human error in applying the wrong lubricant, color code your grease guns and grease fittings. A number of companies sell clear grease gun barrels or colored sleeves to go over the barrels. For the fittings themselves, use matching paint around or colored plastic rings under the fittings.
As part of your housekeeping process, wipe the gun tip and fitting before and after application. A cap on the fitting can also help prevent contamination.
Using these tips will take your asset management strategy to a more precise and effective level.
The article above was published at www.industyweek.com
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