Drive Success with Emotional Intelligence

Article extract from ReliablePlant newsletter:
http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/29252/emotional-intelligence-success

What is emotional intelligence (EI)? If you ask this question, you will probably get many different and vague answers. The fact is that the concept of EI in the workplace and the connection between EI and leadership abilities is still being studied.

Since 1990, Peter Salovey and John D. Mayer, who are considered the leading researchers on EI, have defined it as “the subset of social intelligence that involves the ability to monitor one’s own and others’ feelings and emotions, to discriminate among them, and to use this information to guide one’s thinking and actions.” In short, it is the mental ability to reason about emotions, and the capacity to improve thinking and gain better results by using emotions.

Salovey and Mayer have created a model that identifies four factors of emotional intelligence:

• The perception of emotions
• The ability to reason using emotions
• The ability to understand emotions
• The ability to manage emotions

These four factors refer to the ability to perceive, control and evaluate emotions. Salovey and Mayer propose that the four factors of their model are prioritized from the more basic psychological processes reflecting the relatively simple abilities of perceiving and expressing emotion to the more complex and conscious higher level reflecting the regulation of emotion.

It is a growing belief that leaders and workers who demonstrate emotional intelligence can go a long way toward helping companies improve productivity and profitability. For example, the department head who is brilliant, has a high IQ and may be an expert in his field can get superior results if he also knows how to stay motivated under stress, motivate others, foster complex interpersonal relationships with employees and clients, and build teams.

The Difference Between EI and IQ

EI is the ability to use both your emotions and cognitive skills. EI competencies include empathy, intuition, creativity, flexibility, coping, stress management, and intrapersonal and interpersonal skills. In contrast, IQ is a number used to represent the apparent relative intelligence of a person. IQ is the measure of cognitive abilities only (e.g., the ability to learn, the skilled use of reason, the ability to apply knowledge to manipulate one’s environment or to think abstractly as measured by objective criteria such as tests).

Consider the following two examples:

Anna had a high IQ. She showed strong reasoning skills, was analytical and was focused on tasks. She learned new things quickly. However, she discounted how she and others were feeling. She was known to lose her temper if things did not go the way she expected or wanted. She found it difficult or impossible to relate to people who were not as smart as she was and lacked empathy for others. As a result, her ability to be effective in team situations was limited, even though her IQ was very high.

Jose had a high EI. He demonstrated strong interpersonal and intrapersonal relationship skills, making friends easily and managing his emotions well. This made him highly effective in his work, even though there were others who had higher IQs. A key component of his success, his high EI allowed him to consider the emotional component of interactions, using both his cognitive abilities and his understanding of emotions. He was creative and flexible in the face of adversity and resilient after setbacks. As a result, he was able to influence and motivate people because he understood and took into consideration what mattered to them. His authenticity and integrity made him a natural leader.

The Connection of EI to Effective Leadership and Organizational Success

Organizations are facing enormous challenges related to the downturn in the economic environment. Today, it is recognized that leadership skills are the most important asset of managers. At the heart of great leadership skills is the ability to develop and maintain interpersonal relationships. These skills include communication, active listening, managing conflict, inspiring and motivating individuals and groups, initiating and managing change, and collaborating and cooperating with other to reach shared goals.

The above skills are all traits that are shared by leaders with high EI. This then is the link that connects leaders with EI. Evidence is beginning to emerge that leaders with high emotional intelligence tend to demonstrate an open-mindedness that creates generous, people-oriented attributes, helping them to attract and keep great colleagues and employees.

A leader with high EI is more likely to have the ability to align personal and subordinate goals to accomplish company goals. In their book, "The Flight of the Buffalo," James A. Belasco and Ralph C. Stayer cite four responsibilities that a leader must implement at all levels of an organization:

• Transfer ownership for work to the people who do the work.
• Create an environment that is conducive to the transfer of ownership, a place where each person wants to be responsible for his or her own performance. This means that the leader must paint a clear picture of what great performance looks like for the company and the individual, focusing on performance factors; aligning organization systems, processes and structure to enable successful performance; engaging each individual’s heart, mind and hands in the business of the business; and energizing, motivating and inspiring people around the business focus.
• Develop individual capability and competence.
• Create conditions in the organization that challenge every person to continually learn and grow in skills and knowledge.

These four principles of leadership responsibility align personal and company goals through emotional intelligence.

A study that shows a direct correlation between high EI within leadership ranks and bottom-line profitability was conducted by Harvard psychologist David McClelland in 1996. He studied a large global food and beverage company and found that division leaders with high EI outperformed yearly earnings by 20 percent, while those without high EI underperformed by the same amount.

Danger to Leaders of Emotional Incompetence

Developing emotional intelligence means acknowledging that emotions are always present in the workplace and then consciously doing something intelligent with the emotions. People tend to vary dramatically in the skills to which they use their own emotions and react to the emotions of others. This can be the difference between good leaders and bad leaders.

The behaviors related to low or no EI can be devastating to the overall health of an organization. In 2002, Fortune magazine ran a series of articles on why companies fail. In one such article titled, "Fearing the Boss More than the Competition," the following was stated: "Sometimes CEOs don't get the information they need to make informed decisions. The main reason, says Daniel Goleman, a psychologist and author of the book 'Primal Leadership,' is that subordinates are afraid to tell them the truth. Even when a boss doesn’t intend to quash dissent, subtle signals – a sour expression, a curt response – can broadcast the message that bad news isn’t welcome. That's why, according to a study by Goleman and two associates, higher-ranking executives are less likely to have an accurate assessment of their own performance."

As an executive and management coach, it has been my personal experience that challenges of the leaders with whom I work are seldom related to lack of technical skills but most often are related to emotional failings; they are too authoritarian, they cannot handle conflict, they generate fear rather than respect, etc.

The Role of Emotional Intelligence Today

The best leaders employ many tools and have the ability to be flexible in their leadership style, demonstrating situational leadership. There is no question that effective leadership determines the success of an organization. Organizations that place a strong focus on leaders who demonstrate high EI are able to see the results of high-impact leadership behaviors. High-impact leadership can instill trust and passionate commitment to the organization’s goals, mission and vision, especially during today’s turbulent times. It is this commitment that drives success and profitability.

About the Author

Debbie Zmorenski

Deborah K. Zmorenski, MBA, is the co-owner and senior partner of Leader’s Strategic Advantage Inc., an Orlando, Fla.-based consulting firm. During her 34-year career with the Walt Disney ... Read More

Managing a Multi-Generational Workforce

Article extract from ReliablePlant newsletter:
http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/29273/multi-generational-workforce

Leaders today are facing the most complicated workforce in the history of corporate America. For the first time ever, four generations are working side by side, each at different life stages, and each with conflicting perspectives, expectations and needs.

The members of each of these groups – the Traditionalists, Baby Boomers, Generation X and Generation Y – have largely been shaped by the social and economic events that have occurred during their lifetimes, and each group has very different perspectives and expectations as they relate to jobs and leaders.

The Multi-Generational Workforce

The following is a brief description of each of the four generations, including their characteristics and the social and economic conditions that shaped these people's values and work ethic. Please note that there is more than one opinion on the actual dates used to identify the lines between generations, so it is possible you may have read or heard slightly different dates.

Traditionalists

This generation is also referred to as the veterans or the silent generation. There were 52 million Traditionalists born between 1901 and 1942. They are the keepers of the workplace Holy Grail of yesterday and a pain in the neck to the action-oriented boomers and technology-savvy Xers. While it is true that they are nearing the end of their full-time work life (less than 5 percent are active in the workplace today), they are still solid, no-nonsense performers who tend to exhibit the following characteristics:

• American values
• Civic pride
• Loyalty/dependable
• Respect for authority
• Disciplined (value obedience over individualism)
• Believe in the concept of law and order
• Live by the adage, "An honest day's pay for an honest day's work."
• Oriented to the past (may say things like, "In my day …")
• Conformers
• Logical

The Traditionalists grew up in the industrial age where wonderful, grand inventions made life easier (automobiles, railroads, motels, service stations and air travel). Manufacturing offered consistency in processes and unheard of conveniences as well as guaranteed income. Many of this generation abandoned farms that had dried up during the great Dust Bowl of the 1930s and went to work in the factories in the cities. When the country called for service during World War II, they served with pride and without hesitation. This generation lived through the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl, learning self-discipline to survive. They did not live beyond their means and learned to work hard to take care of their families.

In general, this generation believes in doing the right thing. Decisions and actions should be logical and justifiable. They are disciplined and dislike confusion. They may be resistant to change and need all of the information to make a decision or to be convinced to change. They do not take work for granted, and they have a strong sense of responsibility to family and the job.

The Traditionalist's leadership manner tends to be that of a directive leader with a command-and-control style. Traditionalists will have difficulty in an open and empowered environment, preferring to be the executive decision-maker with the expectation that people will do what they are told.

As the leader, they expect that they will be followed unconditionally as they did when they were the employee. They did not question the boss, and they expect their decisions will be honored without question. They may exhibit traits of the "Type A" manager with a "My way or the highway" attitude. As you can imagine, this leadership style does not sit well with the younger generations, especially X and Y.

You can assist the Traditionalist leader by:

• Being patient but firm
• Clearly articulating the rules or parameters of the company culture
• Coaching them on their people skills
• Assisting them with change
• Providing information in a timely manner
• Respecting and valuing their life and work experience
• Holding everyone accountable for performance and behaviors

Baby Boomers

Born between 1943 and 1960, the Baby Boomer generation, at 76 million, is the largest ever born. Baby Boomers can be broken into two groups: those born in the 1940s and those born in the '50s. There are subtle differences. Those born in the '40s may also exhibit some Traditionalist attributes and characteristics. This generation is best known for their "Peter Pan" syndrome attitude toward life. You may have heard a Baby Boomer say, "50 is the new 30." They are having too much fun to grow up.

Overall, Baby Boomers grew up in optimistic, positive times of economic growth and expansion. The Vietnam War is the defining moment for Boomers. They were the first generation to buck authority and question the country's leaders, protesting the Vietnam War and defecting to avoid service, unlike the Traditionalists who jumped at the chance to serve their country in World War II.

Children of Traditionalists who had found relative stability in the factory and industrial jobs, these children were coddled and nurtured. Their Traditionalist parents wanted to provide them with the things that they did not have. Baby Boomers were told that they were talented and smart and could be anything they desired. As a result, they grew up believing in themselves and their ability to accomplish anything. For the typical Baby Boomer, no challenge is too big. They aggressively tackle problems and have a strong desire to succeed.

Because they are driven to succeed and want to please, they are the generation known for their "live to work" philosophy. In general, Baby Boomers can be characterized by their:

• Passion about participation and spirit in the workplace
• Belief in civil rights, empowerment and diversity
• Belief in growth and expansion
• Pursuit of personal gratification
• Service orientation
• Drive and ambition
• Ability to build and maintain relationships
• Desire to please (family, friends and bosses)
• Lack of interest in all things budget-related

As leaders, you can expect Baby Boomers to demonstrate a consensual style of leadership. They prefer to get everyone involved, consider everyone's ideas and are concerned about the feelings of others. They bring heart and humanity to the office, preferring to create a level playing field for all. They are excellent at building and maintaining relationships.

Baby Boomers are change agents. They believe in growth and expansion and will seek new opportunities to be successful, in turn creating success for the organization. They are very service-oriented and tend to thrive in service-industry roles. They will work hard to achieve goals, and it is not unusual for their goals to be tied to the goals of the organization. They will look for companies whose values align with theirs; and when they find those companies, their loyalty is unmatched.

It's important to know that Baby Boomers like tangible rewards. The rewards do not have to be big or include money. They will certainly value a superior's adulations, but when those adulations come with certificates or small takeaways that can be shown to family and friends, you will find that they will give exceptional levels of service.

There are several challenges for Baby Boomers as leaders. Because they want everyone to be happy, they tend to avoid conflict. It may be very difficult for a Baby Boomer leader to hold people accountable, especially if it involves reprimanding and/or firing someone. They are also not generally budget-minded, as evident in this "plastic generation's" mountain of personal debt. This does not mean that they cannot become competent at budgeting. However, you will find that this is a task they will prefer to delegate if possible. Because the Baby Boomers tend to be self-focused, they may not be open to others' ideas and tend to be poor listeners.

You can assist Baby Boomer leaders by helping them to:

• Learn to actively listen
• Develop budgeting skills
• Learn skills for holding people accountable for delivering results
• Stay focused on project goals

Generation X

Born between 1961 and 1980, this generation, the first children born to the Baby Boomers, are referred to as the latch-key kids. While their parents were working their way up the corporate ladder and working long hours, the Xers came home and took care of themselves. A relatively small generation, approximately 51 million born in the United States, this group saw their parents working incredibly long hours with little free time. Consequently, the Xers made a choice, and that choice was to work to live. Don't be misled; the Xers can be driven in their work if what they want requires it.

One of the biggest misnomers is that the X generation is lazy and does not want to work. These comments are most often made by Boomer or Traditionalist bosses, and this could not be more wrong. Xers just see work differently. They see it as a means to end, not their life. They're willing to work hard but would prefer that the work happen on their terms.

The X generation grew up during more uncertain times. They are the generation that graduated from college and were not able to find a job in their field. They are the children of a 60-percent divorce rate, so they often were raised by one parent or shuffled between parents. They are the first generation of children to experience terrorism on our soil.

Because they learned to take care of themselves at an early age, this generation tends to exhibit the following characteristics:

• Edgy and skeptical
• Change masters
• Technology savvy
• Self-reliant and unimpressed by authority
• Private/keep their own counsel
• Have a non-traditional sense of time
• Are non-conformists and unimpressed by authority

As leaders, they tend to be fair, straightforward and competent. Their communication style is open and honest, and they tend to "tell it like it is."

Challenges for Xers as leaders are that they can be more focused on the task rather than the people. They do not necessarily build relationships easily, and their communication style tends to be brutally honest.
You can assist the Generation X leader by:

• Helping them to focus on building relationships
• Teaching them soft skills (e.g., coaching and counseling) that complement their technical and operational skills
• Assisting them in developing people-oriented communication skills
• Explaining the "why" behind policies and procedures
• Being frank and honest in your communications with them (i.e., say what you mean)

Generation Y

Born between 1981 and 2000, this generation, also called the Echo generation because they closely echo their Boomer parents' attributes and characteristics, is the result of parents who felt guilty about how they raised their Xer children. These parents were devoted to this generation and its needs, making time in their schedules to be soccer moms, little-league dads and making sure that they enjoyed life. There were swimming lessons, dancing lessons, camp and any other form of activity that would make the Generation-Y children happy. As a result, these children led a structured and sheltered life, tending to have great relationships with their parents, believing them to be cool and more like friends.

Because of their diverse activities and exposure to many different kinds of people at an early age, much of it through technology, they are very global. They do not know of a time without the Internet. They have Internet pen pals all over the world.

Generation Y is worldly and very accepting of differences in people. They often see these differences as an opportunity to learn new things and make new friends. They are the most diverse generation ever born, judging people for who they are rather than their ethnic origins, race, religion or sexual orientation.

Having grown up during a time with little strife, a booming economy, doting parents and unprecedented technological advancements, the Y generation tends to exhibit the following characteristics:

• Hopeful and optimistic
• Coddled and nurtured
• Educated
• Technology savvy – even more so than the X generation
• Respect and revere their parents
• Resist traditional categorization by race, religion or sexual orientation
• Look at things non-traditionally
• Multi-taskers and easily bored
• Global

For managers, this generation is the most baffling. Compared to the X generation that required little motivation, were self-starters and did not need micro-managing, the Y generation needs structure and specific direction with follow-up. As more of this generation enters the workforce, companies should begin now to prepare for new ways to recruit, hire and retain these employees. Orientation programs are a must-have, and the style of orientation program must transition from lecture to interactive if companies are to keep the Gen Yers' interest and ensure that they retain the information necessary to deliver on the organization's goals. On-the-job training must be specific, detailed and structured, with check-in and follow-up phases built into the training.

Once they are onboard, the following tips for leading the Y-generation employees will help to create an environment that will retain these employees and ensure that they are motivated to be productive:

• Explain the "why"
• Involve them and ask their opinion
• Treat them and others with respect
• Make time for orienting them
• Provide supervision and structure
• Use a team concept
• Offer more and quality training
• Offer mentoring
• Recognize and reward

Generation Yers have yet to move into the workforce management ranks in big numbers. The youngest are in middle school, and the oldest have recently graduated from college. So while it is not yet known what type of mangers this generation will prove to be, some indications are that they will be more like their Boomer parents, exhibiting a consensual, people-focused style of management.

Leading the multi-generational workforce can be challenging and rewarding, providing opportunities to capitalize on diverse ideas and work styles that bring innovation to the organization. Great leaders will learn to tap into the resources of the multi-generational workforce, mitigate conflict and leverage the varied talents of each employee.

Important Note

One caution I would give in studying this type of information is that there is a real danger of putting people in a box and stereotyping them based on the era in which they were born. Keep in mind that there are Traditionalists who love change and Baby Boomers who hate public recognition. I've said this many times before, and it has become my mantra for leaders: "The best strategy for leading your teams is to know each person as an individual." However, this information can be very useful for understanding how to best motivate, identify and solve conflicts within, and hire for your team.

About the Author

Debbie Zmorenski

Deborah K. Zmorenski, MBA, is the co-owner and senior partner of Leader’s Strategic Advantage Inc., an Orlando, Fla.-based consulting firm. During her 34-year career with the Walt Disney ... Read More

Is Your Plant Organization Shipshape?

Article extract from ReliaPlant newsletter:
http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/28944/plant-organization-shipshape

You are in the engine room of the USS Lincoln. Your job as an oiler is to perform the cleaning and lubrication routes for the steam turbines. You are watching a control panel that monitors all of the ship’s mechanical functions. You have trust that the folks up on the bridge are in agreement about where and how the ship is to travel. All 2,000 sailors rely on the functional teams working in concert to make this voyage a success. You also have faith that this is the finest ship ever built.

From Robert Williamson’s NASCAR model of teamwork to this very large aircraft carrier, there are well-coordinated activities and responsibilities that are carried out in world-class style. Hopefully, this article will cause you to pause and examine the possibilities for you and your organization.

In my role as manager of the U.S. Postal Service’s Technical Support Center, I approved all maintenance management and maintenance work directives and manuals that were transmitted to the 450 plants to the 16,000 field technicians through their plant maintenance organizations. When I occasioned to visit plant workroom floors, I sought out the maintenance technicians and let them meet the name at the bottom of the directives. I usually inquired about the working environment in which they carried out their daily tasks. The usual questions were about information, tools, scheduling, equipment conditions and the visibility of top management.

The responses were what I expected given the metrics I reviewed and my knowledge of the individual plants. What I began to focus on was the response to this question: If I was able to clap my hands and something magically changes in your plant, what would you want to change?

More often than not, their response was: “We want managers to talk to managers and there be continuity in our operations across shifts and interfunction. It appears that managers are competing within their ranks — for what, we don’t know.”

Over the years, I probably asked this of several hundred employees, and many of the answers related to the interaction of management within the plant. They wanted the magic fix to be management that worked together, shift changes that were transparent, maintenance to work with operations, supervisors to be knowledgeable about expectations, and to feel part of the team. In essence, they wanted to perform like the USS Lincoln.

The best model to explain their chagrin is that of an organization chart turned 90 degrees. Think of the “Sweet Sixteen” in the national college basketball tournament. Where the normal organization chart represents structure, information and decision flow, the employees view it as a competition chart with management competing for different prizes that they do not understand. Is it power, turf, pride, confusion, floundering, ineptitude, leadership or mission that causes this issue?

I asked them to give examples. Their responses were:

• Operations priorities do not match those of maintenance or customer service.
• There is no shift transition process. This can be between maintenance shifts or within operations.
• Process improvements on one shift are discarded by the next shift.
• Managers purposely avoid other managers.
• On-the-job training and breaking in new employees take too much time away from productive activities.
• The most important employees (the machine operators and the maintenance technicians) are not a part of the management team.
• Human resources does not support the supervisors.
• The plant is dirty and signage is outdated.
• We are unaware of the mission and goals.
• There are conflicting goals.

They don’t want to run the place; they just want to know the game plan and where the ship is on its voyage.

Best Ways to Prevent Equipment Problems

Article extract from MachineryLubrication newsletter:
http://www.machinerylubrication.com/Read/30560/prevent-equipment-problems

Preventive maintenance methods are often promoted but rarely put into practice. This article will attempt to encourage a paradigm shift in maintenance thinking with prevention driving most of the activities. The main thrust will be on leadership and not 
simply management.


Leadership vs. Management


The classic definition of management is to do things right. The definition of leadership is to do the right things. The difference may be subtle but very important. How often have you witnessed someone planning a repair job to be completed within an allotted timeframe when no one was asking why this repair needed to be made so frequently? 


A manager attempts to get work done on time, while a leader attempts to minimize or eliminate the required work. A manager continually asks for more people, while a leader tries to maximize the effectiveness of his or her staff. A manager tackles problems as they arrive, while a leader asks why continual problems are tolerated.


Prevention Depends 
on Leadership


Without proper leadership, problem prevention is very difficult to achieve. The following case studies illustrate a variety of situations in which preventive techniques were used effectively in a typical mill environment.


A Poorly Designed 
Hydraulic System 


In this mill, steel slabs issuing from a caster started as a long, continuous hot metal strand. A torch cutter sliced off 30-foot slabs from the front end as the strand moved at a slow pace. The slabs were lifted off the table rolls and stacked for delivery to a storage yard by a carrier. The tongs resembled two pairs of giant 10-foot scissors operated by hydraulic cylinders and fed by a hydraulic system mounted near the top of the scissor arms. The system had a vertical tank with a pump mounted beside it. Due to space limitations, the valves, tubing and hoses were located directly over the pump and motor, making for a very congested design. The entire assembly hung from a crane. When an O-ring blew or a valve needed changing, quite a bit of disassembly was required to access the bad part. A lot of time was also wasted with repairs on this equipment due to the design.


The cause of the problem was obvious, and only a redesign would suffice. The supplier of the tongs was contacted and told the system design was inadequate. With “manifolding” technology, much of the pipe, tubing and hoses could be eliminated as well as the congestion in the confined spaces. The supplier agreed to redesign this part of the system, which solved the problem. This case exemplified a unique issue where only prevention of future problems would suffice. Learning to live with the problem was not an option.

Inefficient Purchasing 
of Lubricants


At this particular company, lubricants and hydraulic fluids were purchased by individual departments with no coordination between them. Consequently, the number of brands proliferated, increasing the chances of duplication. Products were procured by brand name, and the purchasing department had no choice but to buy what was requested. Because lubricants were purchased by brand name with no competition, suspicions arose that prices might be excessive. When a problem arose, quality was blamed and another supplier was brought in to solve it.


It was suspected that the company was living with a problem that could be resolved. Because ASTM and other test methods could help determine product quality, a committee was formed to decide how to purchase lubricants based on these tests. A strategy was soon developed. All products would be tested for important parameters to uncover duplicates. Products would be separated by categories such as petroleum hydraulic fluids, fire-resistant hydraulic fluids, general-purpose greases, electric-motor bearing greases, petroleum turbine oils, gear oils, anti-friction bearing oils, petroleum circulating oils and synthetic oils.


Specifications were also written for each lubricant type based on the test results of the higher grades in each category. Every specification was assigned a unique number, and equipment throughout the plant was tagged with the number of the product it was 
to receive.


The specifications were sent out for bids from various suppliers. The lowest bidder was awarded the business for one year. The prices received were markedly lower than the comparable branded products.


After the initial groundwork was completed, the system began to function well. The inventory shrank because so many locations used the same products. Purchasing in bulk became possible due to consolidation, which also resulted in a reduction in drums and costs. Samples of incoming products were taken periodically to ensure quality. Gradually, the overall quality improved. 


The goal of the system was to purchase high-quality products at the least possible cost and to eliminate as many empty drums as possible. Mistakes related to applying the wrong lubricant were also reduced. Once the system was in place, it took very little time to maintain it. 


This was an example of a plant living with a problem that not many thought was a problem. It was only after some penetrating questions were asked that most were convinced that there might be a better way of doing things. How the plant was purchasing lubricants was costing much more than necessary both in dollars and in manpower.


Short Motor Bearing Life


In this hot mill, as the steel strand issues from the last finishing stand, a long series of rolls conveys it at high speed to the coilers. Each roll is individually driven by an electric motor. Water cascades down from sprays to cool the strip as it speeds toward the coilers. Despite elaborate splash guards, it is almost impossible to keep water off the motor shafts. The shaft seals were not adequate to keep water out of the motors, and trying different seal designs did not help. The motor repair shop could barely keep up with all the failures. Finally, a seal company recommended adding flingers on the shaft. These consisted of a rubber device that looked much like a shaft seal but with a hole in the center slightly smaller than the shaft diameter. As a motor was repaired and ready to ship, the repairman would slip a flinger onto the shaft up to the housing. When the motor was installed in this wet environment, any water that migrated toward the seal area would be flung off due to the rotating flinger. In this way, water could not get to the seal. Motor bearing life increased tremendously. In this instance, a serious problem was prevented with a simple device but only after someone asked why this was being tolerated.


Frequent Servo-valve Repairs


As steel mill technology improved, more and more servo valves were being used on the mill’s hydraulic systems to gain precision. Because of dirt sensitivity, systems with servo valves must be filtered to extreme cleanliness. Despite great efforts, servo-valve losses were becoming excessive at the mill. Costs were also high since the repairs could not be done in-house. 


To prevent these failures, a non-bypass duplex filter separated by a three-way valve with an electrical alarm was installed ahead of each valve. The filters had a cleanliness level of 1 to 2 microns. When the alarm sounded, maintenance personnel knew they had only a few minutes to switch the three-way valve to the clean side before a shutdown occurred. A clean filter element was always on standby. The result was that the servo-valve failures virtually ceased.


Once again, a simple design change prevented a serious problem. However, the difference with the servo-valve issue was that production was being affected as well as repair costs.

Excessive Oil Losses


Oil losses were becoming excessive in the mill’s hydraulic and lubrication systems. The millwrights dutifully kept the systems filled and operating but did not report all the oil additions as they were made. When additions were reported, there was no good method for determining the amount. Therefore, it was difficult to establish where the bad leaks were and to schedule repairs. Prevention or reduction of these oil losses was the goal, but they could only be attacked when they occurred.


The decision was made to mount small water meters on the fill lines to each system. These meters had some internal friction, but since the oil was being pumped in as makeup oil, the pressure required was adequate. In cases where the oil flowed by gravity from an upper to a lower floor, low-friction meters were required. Each day, an inspector read the meters to determine if any leaks had gone unreported. If so, action was taken. This was an example of taking preventive action (reading the meters) to prevent further losses. No action could be taken without proper information supplied by the meters.


Rapid Motor Burnouts


The plant’s coke oven doors are approximately 20 feet tall and 4 feet wide. They are made of steel, lined with firebrick and weigh about 1,000 pounds. Each is mounted vertically on each end of the oven and must be lifted off by a huge machine so the red-hot coke can be pushed out. The doors are held in place by two steel arms that are rotated into place behind vertical “buckstays.” In the center of the arms is a hexagonal nut that is 5 inches in diameter. The arms are rotated by a large socket that fits the hexagonal nut and is operated by a motor and gear reducer mounted on the machine. The arms often become wedged behind the buckstays, so an electrician must hold in the overload relays to get the motor to turn. Frequent motor burnouts were attributed to this practice. 


Rather than increase the size of the motors, the decision was made to convert the operation to hydraulic motors due to the inherent overload protection in such a system. Relief-valve adjustment serves this purpose.


Because of the large amount of dirt inherent in the coke plant and the dirt sensitivity of the hydraulic motors, the hydraulic systems were redesigned. This redesign was so successful that no hydraulic motor failures occurred for the first five years. The improved cleanliness also increased pump life. This case was an example of prevention involving a radical design change with which not everyone agreed.


Unchecked Oil Temperatures


At another hot mill in the Pittsburgh area, the challenge was determining the cause of losing several back-up bearings. It seemed to be a case of the oil overheating, but when the coolers were examined, none of the thermometers was working. It also appeared that no one was checking the key system parameters, such as temperature, water content, flow, tank levels and cleanliness. 


When the thermometers were replaced, oil temperatures of 175 degrees F were observed. Evidently, the coolers were having no effect. Once the coolers were replaced, the problem ceased. 


This was a case of not paying attention to signs that can warn of impending problems. Management hastily instituted a form to be completed on each shift that forced someone to watch those important system parameters. 


Misreported Oil Demulsibility 


Oil purchased for the mill’s back-up bearing system needed to be able to drop out water quickly. The purchasing specifications gave a very strict number that had to be obtained from the ASTM D-2711 test. ASTM D-1401 is another test for demulsibility, but it is used for light oils. The heavier oils utilized for these back-up bearings had to be tested with the former test, although it took much longer than the ASTM D-1401 test. 


The mill was experiencing a rise in water levels with samples tested from new loads of oil. Samples taken from in-service oil were having the same problem. Under normal conditions, the water levels should have remained under 5 percent but were now 20 percent. The lab assured the mill that the samples of new oil were within the specification. This situation continued for several months as an investigation was conducted. There were concerns that back-up losses would soon begin rising. 


As luck would have it, the lab shut down, which meant the mill had to find another one. When the next sample was sent to the new lab, the mill immediately received a call that the demulsibility was below specification. The load had been pumped out and replaced with a load from another company. It turned out that the old lab had been using the ASTM D-1401 test because it was quicker than the D-2711 test but did not inform the mill. The oil supplier didn’t even have the equipment to perform the D-2711 test but was relying on its additive supplier to provide the percentage to use. This was a case of having all the needed tools in place but still getting bad information.


Three Phases of Prevention


These case studies encompass preventive actions for three types of situations: an obvious situation, a change of methods situation and an unseen situation. Each of these is described below.


An Obvious Situation


These situations are like the poorly designed hydraulic system or the electric motor bearing issue. The problem is very costly, and the solution is either obvious or requires a design change. The solution will also require time, money and the will to do it. Most agree that solving the problem is worth a try since it is easily seen. These situations are usually designated as “crises.” The alternative is to learn to live with the problem.


A Change of Methods Situation


These situations involve a long-standing way of doing things, such as each department buying lubricants with no attempt at consolidation or not reporting system fluid additions. Although the problems are seen, not everyone envisions a solution or agrees one is needed. Personnel have learned to live with the problem. Basically, the way things are done must be changed.


An “Unseen” Situation


Many times actions can be taken to prevent bad things from happening. These include condition monitoring, regular inspections, close monitoring of system gauges and oil sampling for laboratory tests. Every plant system has parameters that must be checked periodically. These checks consist of people making an assessment of the condition and filing accurate reports. When these people do their jobs correctly, bad things are prevented. 


Short-sighted managers only “see” the people who repair things. Those focused on prevention work in a less dramatic environment. Consequently, when the economy is poor, these jobs often are eliminated. 


Leaders not only must ensure the “seen” is handled efficiently but also that the “unseen” is not neglected. The “unseen” typically requires recognizing the indications of bad things about to happen, which can often be identified in regular inspections by sight, feel, smell or hearing. However, most of the “unseen” must be detected by equipment. This would include temperature, vibration, sound and lab tests. 


The “unseen” also involves a conviction that technology can be used to predict events in order to avoid or plan for them. This conviction is an important leadership attribute. Remember, managers don’t see the “unseen,” but leaders do.

Machinery Lubrication (8/2016)

Expert Tips for Planning a CMMS Project

Article extract from ReliaPlant newsletter:
http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/28932/planning-cmms-project

A well-planned and executed computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) project can yield a maximum return on your investment. This return is realized through increased efficiency, productivity and profits. However, a poorly planned and executed CMMS project can result in a loss of revenue. These losses can be measured in terms of the overall investment in the project, as well as from wasted time and lost projected revenue forecast tied to the successful installation and implementation of a CMMS.

Planning

Properly planning the CMMS implementation project is one of the key elements. In the planning phase, you determine the “what,” “why,” “who” and “how.”

Equipment Data

Developing a plan for equipment data is a good first step because it will provide a CMMS with a foundation of hard, verifiable data. Some maintenance departments may already employ an equipment numbering scheme that is effective. This can easily be translated into the CMMS. If there is no scheme currently in place or if the current one is flawed, it is time to develop an equipment numbering scheme.

Determining an equipment hierarchy is the next step. This involves setting up parent/child relationships among equipment. For example, an air handler can have pumps and motors as children. If you are going to keep track of both the parent and children, the relationship must be documented. Make sure to include every piece of equipment that falls under that hierarchy scheme. Parent/child relationships also can be constructed for whole facilities. For instance, a building could be the parent with each floor a child. Each room could then be a child of the floor.

Information on spare parts should be tagged to the individual pieces of equipment. This is referred to as the bill of material (BOM).

Finally, you need to decide what you want from your CMMS in terms of downtime monitoring. You should choose which pieces of equipment you want to monitor as well as how you want to track planned vs. unplanned downtime. Plan based on impact or loss of operation. You should have this information for each piece of equipment or at least for critical equipment.

Preventive Maintenance

The following decisions have to be made for each preventive maintenance (PM) task:

• Will the PM be performed by calendar time or run time (miles, hours, etc.)?
• Will the PM follow a fixed schedule (regardless of completion date) or a schedule based on completion date?
• How often will PM work orders be generated (daily, weekly, monthly, etc.)?
• What are the strategies for route-based PMs? (For example, an inspection route for all fire extinguishers in a building.)

Procedures

Procedures can be preventive maintenance, safety instructions or any other set of instructions. Each piece of equipment should have identified for it all the preventive, corrective and predictive maintenance tasks necessary to properly maintain that equipment. Along with the maintenance task, information regarding maintenance frequency, responsible craft, repair and/or consumable parts necessary to compete the maintenance task, and time estimated to compete the task are some of the additional information that will enhance the usefulness of your CMMS database. These procedures can then be applied anywhere within the CMMS.

Labor

You need information on each maintenance technician such as name, address, phone, Social Security number, etc. You also have to decide if you are going to use some sort of ID card for your technicians that can be scanned by a reader. If you do, will the cards be produced in-house or by an outside vendor?

Inventory

The following actions must be taken:
First, you have to develop a part-numbering scheme. This is similar to the process used for equipment numbering. Some companies use a 20- to 30-character-long part-numbering scheme. It includes every detail of that part (i.e., type of part, thickness, diameter, location, etc.). With advances in CMMS and a field available for each of these details (category, dimensions, location, etc.), you don’t need a part-numbering scheme to include all of the details. It just increases the potential for data-entry errors.

Implicit in the development of a part-numbering scheme is the need to concretely define the details of parts. The most useful in terms of work flow is defining the location of a part. Is there one or multiple stockrooms? Is there a location scheme within the stockroom (i.e., aisle, bins, shelves, etc.)?

In the data-gathering phase, you will compile a list of all the vendors from which you buy parts and services. One of them should be assigned as a primary vendor for each part. The CMMS automatically generates purchase orders to the primary vendors. This can be changed by the users if desired.


At this stage, you have to decide the criteria for selecting a primary vendor (i.e., price, delivery, overall service, etc.). Additionally, you should track vendor/manufacturer part numbers for cross-referencing purposes. You also need to decide the issue units that you are going to use (metric, British or a combination of both). How are you going to handle inventory of pipes, beams, etc.? Are you going to keep track of lengths? If a piece is cut, are you going to keep track of the remaining pipe length? Once vendor and tracking information is decided upon, you also need to determine:

• Who has the authority to order parts and up to what amount?
• Beyond what amount will further approval be required?

In the overall planning of the physical inventory process, you must make the following decisions:

• How often are you going to take the physical inventory?
• Who is going to do it?
• Is it going to be manual or using mobile technology? If it is manual, make sure your CMMS has the capability to print the appropriate forms for this purpose.

Associated with this step is development of a parts label design and barcode label design. What information do you want to print on the parts labels? Part number, description and location are typical. If you are using barcoding with inventory, you have to decide which information items you want barcoded. Part number and location are typical.

If you have multiple plants/facilities, it is important that every facility follows the same schemes. Without consistency, the CMMS will not be very effective. If you are looking for a part at a different facility and that facility describes the part differently than you do, you may not find it even if it is in stock.

Purchasing and Accounting

You likely will need the purchasing and accounting departments involved in the planning phase for these:

• “Bill to” information
• “Ship to” information
• Sales tax rate
• Determine budget accounts and amounts

Codes

You should determine what plan and design codes will be used throughout the CMMS. During the planning phase, you need to decide on strategies for the basis of codes. Actual compilation of codes will be done during the data-gathering phase. Determine the following:

• Account codes
• Work order type
• Failure codes
• Action codes
• Repair codes
• Work order priority
• Equipment criticality
• Work order status
• Purchase order status
• Departments

Mobile Applications

If you are employing mobile applications, you need to identify each application and work on articulating the details. Some examples include using a hand-held remote data-entry device to collect equipment meter readings, parts can be issued and/or returned using a hand-held device, hand-held devices can be used to count and track inventory parts, etc.

Backup

Decisions also need to be made regarding data backup. An articulated backup scheme should be formed that takes into account both hardware and setup. Determine how often backup will be done (daily, weekly, etc.).

History

Plan for the type of maintenance history you want to maintain. Your decisions should include date performed, task performed, the person(s) who performed the job, estimated and actual time to perform, equipment performed on, material used, and any outside contractor cost incurred.

Decisions

Several decisions need to be made regarding the general operation of your CMMS. These questions provide information not only for planning but also for evaluating current capabilities:

• Are you going to print estimated time on work orders?
• What details of reports are needed in your CMMS?
• Which reports are needed in graphics format?
• What decisions will be made based on reports analysis?
• Security issues: Who is permitted to do what?
• Field legends: Do you need to change the terms provided by your CMMS on any of the legends? If yes, be sure to document the changes.

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)

Develop a list of KPIs for your application. At this stage, you should review them and revise, if necessary. Also, determine how you would compute those KPIs. Most of the KPIs should come from CMMS reporting.

Assign Responsibilities

Plan on who will:

• Install the hardware (if necessary)
• Maintain the computer hardware, backups, etc.
• Perform archiving and merging of data
• Take care of disaster recovery
• Generate reports
• Review and analyze various reports
• Plan and schedule work orders
• Do the ongoing data entry
• Close work orders
• Be responsible for customizing, configuring, tailoring and maintaining the CMMS

The planning stage of a CMMS is perhaps one of the most important in ensuring success. Granted, implementation itself is not a short process, but with a well-laid-out plan where all possibilities are considered, the process will be simpler and streamlined.

The major challenge in planning a CMMS is considering the entire breadth of your operation down to every last piece of equipment, part and facility, and then remaining realistic with your goals. Consider the abilities of your operation to adapt to a new technology in a manner that will not unduly disrupt workflow. With a laid-out plan, you will reap the rewards for many years.

About the Author

Kris Bagadia

Kris Bagadia is the founder and president of PEAK Industrial Solutions. He has experience in all facets of the maintenance management process and has stayed at the forefront of CMMS/EAM technology ... Read More

How to Manage Lubrication Information

Article extract from Noria newsletter:
http://www.machinerylubrication.com/Read/30529/manage-lubrication-information

"What is the best way to manage lubrication information for plant assets and their maintenance records?"

Information management is a key factor in the success of a maintenance and reliability program. It is also one of the most challenging aspects due to its complexity.

The first step is to employ a good system (software) that can manage your asset information properly. The system should include a complete database of asset information (models, specifications, capacities, etc.), detailed information for each asset's lubrication requirements (lube points, lubricants to use, lubricant capacity, frequencies, etc.) and comprehensive information related to the work instructions (safety requirements, necessary materials, time to complete the task, relevant activities and lubrication data).

The management system should also be able to generate routes based on different criteria (lubricant type, geographical area, machine type, task and frequency) and work orders according to their priority (critical machines, tasks due, routine or on condition).

Do not overlook the role of the maintenance team, which must be trained and qualified to execute the required lube routes and tasks. Floor personnel should also collect information about the results, including completed tasks, detected abnormal conditions or the need for additional actions. Appropriate written instructions, checklists and records must be available to support these activities.

The collected information should be saved in the management system for maintenance administration and stored for as many years as practical. This historical information can then be analyzed to identify trends and failure frequencies in order to improve the plant's maintenance strategy. Reports can also be created to show the performance of different aspects in the program.

A system of performance indicators will be necessary to monitor the program's progress and results. Remember, processes that are not measured are also typically not controlled. The system should have the capability to not only generate statistics and calculations on the overall maintenance program but also the performance of various parameters, such as lubricant consumption, machine failures, cleanliness targets, etc.

All maintenance and reliability team members should have access to this information based on their level of involvement in the program. This will encourage them to embrace ownership of the work being performed.

While it may take time to implement a system with all of these suggested attributes, it is important to keep in mind that good information management starts with a robust database and detailed work procedures and policies.

Securing Your Future with Proactive Maintenance

Article extract from Machinery Lubrication newsletter:

One of my earliest mentors taught me there are essentially two types of business activity: present bank and future bank. In other words, there is activity that generates revenue this month or quarter (present bank), and there is activity that will generate revenue several quarters or even years down the track (future bank). Usually, the two activities are mutually exclusive.

Consider a rancher who wants to grow his herd through natural increase. Every female calf he keeps to add to his breeding stock is a deposit in his future bank, but it comes at a cost to his present bank - it’s a calf he cannot sell now. This means for the rancher, like most businesses, there’s an ever-present temptation to borrow from the future bank to improve present bank results. Therein lies the dichotomy: you can’t have it both ways.

Equipment operation is essentially a business activity, and the approach taken to its maintenance involves this present-bank/future-bank dichotomy. At a recent seminar I presented, a student described how very little predictive maintenance is done at the iron-ore mine where he works. Hydraulic components are changed out, and oil is dumped until problems go away. A hydraulic excavator worth $7 million digs $1 million of iron ore a day, so the largely unnecessary replacement of $90,000 worth of hydraulic components and $18,000 worth of hydraulic oil in a single day is tolerated and even encouraged to minimize downtime.

The Value of Proactive Maintenance

The cost of proactive maintenance is much different than that of preventive, predictive and breakdown maintenance. This is because you don’t actually have any kind of impending condition. Proactive maintenance is a vigilant activity of controlling things, as opposed to letting things fail on their own and then simply just changing out components or letting a breakdown occur.

This production-at-any-cost mentality is present bank over future bank in the extreme. There’s no doubt iron-ore miners are making hay at the moment, but theirs is a cyclical business. I remember the last mining recession very well. Miners were guarding every penny. When the current boom ends, these miners will have a real problem. They can’t just flick a switch and go from production at any cost to a lean and mean operation. Their legacy systems and workforce culture won’t allow it - not quickly anyway. They will pay a penalty for not making future-bank deposits to their maintenance systems, practices and people during the boom times.

This is not the only way present bank can be made to profit at the expense of future bank in a maintenance context. Another is borrowing from the future bank to reduce the initial capital outlay for an asset. This future-bank loan is subsequently repaid with interest as a result of less-than-optimum reliability over the useful life of the machine.

In the case of a hydraulic machine, the achievement of optimal maintenance and reliability outcomes is all too often compromised at the outset through bad or cheap design. Oil quality, tank size, filtration, installed cooling capacity, conductor size, connector type and component efficiency are just a few of the corners that are all too easy to cut in a race to the bottom on price.

95%	of lubrication professionals view proactive maintenance as an investment, according to a recent poll at machinerylubrication.com

Even a relatively well-designed (from a maintenance and reliability perspective) hydraulic machine will suffer from reliability issues if left to its own devices over time. This means optimal maintenance and reliability outcomes require a certain level of knowledge and intervention on the part of the end user. If these necessary maintenance interventions are deferred or omitted, the result once again is that present bank makes an increased profit at the expense of future bank.

When proactive maintenance is performed correctly and effectively, every dollar spent on it should come back with friends attached. This makes the expense a future-bank deposit. However, the present-bank/future-bank dichotomy means both discipline and resolve are needed to resist the natural skew to present-bank economics and to keep making these future-bank deposits in good times and in bad.

About the Author

Brendan Casey

Brendan Casey has more than 20 years experience in the maintenance, repair and overhaul of mobile and industrial equipment. For more information on reducing the operating cost and increasing the ... Read More

Ensure Planning and Scheduling Success

Article extract from Reliable plant newsletter:
http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/28924/planning-scheduling-success

How do you initially train someone new to the planner/scheduler position? First, let’s talk about the selection process, as I see this as an issue in many organizations. Ideally, the planner/scheduler should be one of your best craftspeople. You have to compensate the position at a level at least equal to your first-level supervision. The compensation should include accounting for the average overtime earned as a craftsperson if you expect them to apply for the position. You will not get many applicants if you are asking them to accept a significant reduction in their pay.

In addition to being a highly skilled craftsperson, the candidate should have good computer skills, a positive attitude, people-oriented and be self-motivated.

After you have identified the right person, the obvious next step is to get that person trained. You generally have a couple of choices here. You can send them off to a class, or you can host an on-site course.

This brings us to another question. How do you help guarantee success with planning and scheduling? Realize that you can send a planner/scheduler off to training, have them return and, despite their best efforts, the organization will not allow them to plan and schedule work. Providing the on-site course will allow you to educate supervisors, team leaders, managers, engineering personnel, production supervisors, production planners and anyone else who interacts with the maintenance work management process. Now everyone can understand not only the roles and responsibilities of the planner/scheduler, but also their own roles and responsibilities in relationship to the work management process.

When I teach maintenance planning and scheduling classes, I want to share a number of approaches. There are a several methods and opinions on how to plan and schedule work. What I find is that some groups actually do a disservice to their course participants by not sharing a comprehensive approach with various methods.

After the initial training is complete, recognize that you are only one-third to halfway done. After about one to two months, it’s time to bring in a coach. Ideally, the coach is an external resource who walks a mile beside the new planner/scheduler. The purpose of this is to observe the activities of the planner/scheduler and also the interactions within the organization.

When I coach and mentor, I’m looking to determine if the planner/scheduler is applying the items learned in the class. Are they creating job plans? Is the continuous improvement loop in place? Is the planner/scheduler focused on the future?

Next, I’m looking to see how the supervisors are interacting. Do they understand their roles and the planner’s roles? Are work orders being completed and data entered into the CMMS? Is the organization aligned for proactive scheduling? These are just a few of the items that I address in my coaching sessions.

The number of coaching sessions depends on the organization. It may only be one to two in total. Now, about retraining, a number of organizations bring me back on a semi-annual to annual basis to provide an overall best practices health check as a good method to determine if the organization is continuing to mature in its implementation efforts. If it has gone stagnant, I’ll point out the obstacles and help get them back on the road to success. Ultimately, this is my primary goal. I have a passion for maintenance and operations, so I really care about people being successful.

If not an external resource, someone internally needs to remove the obstacles to ensure effective planning and scheduling.

With respect to retraining, you should always be in a state of constant learning. That means reading articles and attending events that foster learning.

During a two-day maintenance management course in California’s wine country, I met a planner/scheduler who attended the course the previous year. At the end of the course, I asked him why he chose to re-attend so soon afterward. He mentioned that he had forgotten a number of items, and the main one was creating job plans. Wow! Besides scheduling the work, this is one of the most important parts of planning and scheduling. This example highlights the need for retraining, especially if you opted not to provide coaching.

About the Author

Jeff Shiver

As managing principal for People and Processes, Jeff Shiver helps organizations implement best practices for maintenance and operations. Prior to this post, Jeff was a practitioner who worked 25 ... Read More

A benchmark for the flexibility and adaptability of maintenance management system

Article below was extracted from:
http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/28900/condition-monitoring-saving

Although the content is suppose to focus on the advantages of good condition monitoring, but pay attention to how maintenance parameters such as criticality, priority and frequency changes dynamically. Notice also the flexibility and adaptability of their system to cope with the dynamism. That is what I would consider a World Class Maintenance practice.

Saving Time and Money with Condition Monitoring

Andy Gailey    

A recent acoustic emission (AE) study identified a potential critical bearing failure that became a planned preventive action for a leading food manufacturer. This also avoided considerable cost and unplanned downtime.
The acoustic emission equipment and the main tool used during the planned inspection routes were manufactured by Holroyd Instruments. This example will show the value of this type of equipment in avoiding a major unplanned event that could have had massive cost consequences for the business. Collateral damage to the associated equipment would have proved very costly, and the lead time to rebuild could have caused extensive downtime that would have meant disgruntled customers not being able to rely on stock availability.
The story began in April 2010 when some initial elevated readings were noted at two node points on a large step-down transfer gearbox that were sampled on a seven-day routine. The distress readings were elevated and triggered the alarm level. They were of concern and evident on subsequent inspections. The third elevated reading that was part of an upward trend instigated a planned work order in the computerized maintenance-management system (CMMS) to investigate and take further action. This equipment could not be taken out of service lightly, as it was at the time constrained by high production demands. Experience with a sister line’s previous planned bearing change also played an important part in the escalation of the risk.

The input side of a transfer gearbox is shown with the output bearing node point on the left-hand side.
On more detailed inspections, it was determined that the bearing with the highest distress was indeed the suspected output bearing. Audible clicks were loud and clear at the output end bearing. The two bearings at the node locations were on the drive line of the motor at the input and output ends of the transfer gearbox. The adjacent bearings on the large, helical step-down gear were still reading low and had no audible clicks. The engineering manager was advised that there was an anomaly on one of the input bearings, that the others were in good condition and that production could continue with targeted condition monitoring. The routine oil sampling was increased from monthly to every two weeks. AE inspections were increased, with spectrum readings now on a four-day cycle. This would give some comparative evidence when the new bearings were eventually fitted.
The planned change of the bearing set was arranged with the production planner, maintenance manager and product specialist. It became clear that the equipment would have to operate for at least another six months until it became available. Contingency plans were formulated for an emergency change if any of the AE readings or oil samples showed advances toward failure. Warnings were issued that this could occur rapidly if the bearing failed. A new bearing set was purchased, and a meeting was scheduled with the bearing manufacturer to examine the used bearings when they were eventually changed in early 2011.
The AE readings stayed at an elevated level during this long waiting phase, and oil sample results showed no elevated readings in the key elements associated with roller bearing failures. During the weeks before renewal, many spectra were taken from all points of the gearbox for future evaluation. This would rule out frequencies from the oil pump and other components around the assembly. An AE envelope spectrum graph before the bearing change is shown below.

As can be seen, there was something creating a spike at 73Hz, which happened to match the frequency of the bearing race. This provided a clue that there was a race surface defect of some kind and not an element breaking down or the cage disintegrating.
The bearing change finally took place, and the production plant was turned around within 12 hours so that the equipment did not incur any unplanned downtime. The used bearing set was returned with the transfer gearbox, and the two units were degreased. On first inspection, they both looked similar and in good order. The elements and cages were then dismantled from the outer and inner races, with care taken to keep them in order and in the correct aspect for reassembly later.
It became clear that on the suspect output bearing, a major spall on the inner race had developed, and every element was pitted with the debris that had emitted. At this point, a representative from the bearing manufacturer was invited to visit and examine the bearings. He concurred that the bearings had lasted very well considering the atmosphere and heat in which they had operated for almost 10 years. This would be considered an end-of-lifetime mode of failure. It may have lasted many more months or could have accelerated to failure within days or weeks. The photograph below is of the spall that measured approximately 10 mm in length and 2.5 mm wide.

Spall damage to the race is shown above with feathered edges and surface pitting in the loaded area of the spalling. Note the next layer of material on the right-hand side that would have given way.
When the remedial work had been completed, additional spectrum samples were recorded and monitored to learn more. Carpet noise levels were lower, and the decibel scale was a third of the previous graph example. The maximum peak was now less than 0.4 decibels, while the carpet level was less than 0.2 decibels.
In conclusion, the systems and tools relied on every day proved effective in capturing this anomaly before it turned into a major event. The key to this was the full involvement of engineering with operations to plan in the remedial work with as little disruption as possible.
Among the lessons learned were that the inspection frequencies at seven-day intervals were correct for this critical plant, the preventive action was started at the earliest opportunity, the equipment enabled the pinpointing of the bearing fault, the audio facility allowed a second reference that linked rpm with the audible clicks and that this all gave sufficient evidence for the planned work to commence at the earliest opportunity.
Root-cause analysis was carried out directly after the bearing change was completed to investigate any future recommendations for servicing this equipment. It was decided that as the bearings had reached their end-of-life cycle, there was no need to alter any future planned maintenance. Condition monitoring with AE had provided the confidence to pick up any anomalies at a very early stage in the curve.

Equipment Registry aka Master Equipment List aka Asset Register

The term used for the registry or list varies from organisation to organisation, but it basically refer to the list of all money making assets which were constructed in the process plant or facility.

To set the scene, I'm quoting from Reliable Plant article, authored by Bob Schindler,

"The equipment registry is one of the most important tools in your kit when it comes to maintenance and reliability. It can be the foundation of your planned maintenance, lubrication, training and repair programs, as well as help with regulatory compliance and safety programs.

Your spare parts management program depends upon a complete and accurate registry with the requisite analysis for regular service parts along with the insurance spares identified through failure modes and effects analysis. Don’t forget that your financials are also tied in through depreciation, amortization and cost center assignments.

Equipment history gets tied to the registry along with manuals, drawings, procedures, labor costs and reports. That is why it is the foundation upon which so much is built, and that is why it is so vital that you get it right and work to maintain its accuracy.

While it has an initial cost and a maintenance cost, the payback can be significant and continuous, so make the investment even if you have to bump something else down the list. The man-hours that you save long term will repay your investment many times over. You can consider the downtime and spares savings as icing on the cake."

I personally could not emphasize enough how important that is. It may sound very obvious that it is the most fundamental things to do is to have an Asset Register, but unfortunately, common sense is not as common as we all thought. I have been to many plants, and I have never seen an Asset Register that is 100% yet. The best would be somewhere around 98%, the worst I have personally seen would probably in the 70% mark along with poor labelling and documentation. I would not be surprised to walk into a plant without an Asset Register. Why? I have come across plant managers who doesn't know their plant's statutory requirement, and licenses required to be a plant manager.

To people initiating projects out there, please ensure your contractor provide you with a complete register. To the managements, please don't slash the cost for such thing. It will cost the organisation big money for a loooooong time.

Operations & Maintenance combined! - Something to ponder about...

Copied from: http://www.reliableplant.com/Read/28849/maintenance-operations-coexist
received in Reliable Plant Newsletter.

Can Maintenance and Operations Coexist?

Rex M. Gallaher

Most of us come from traditional plant organizations with an operations group and a maintenance group with their own supervisors and specialized skilled crafts.
One of the major European postal services decided in the late 1990s to make a change in their plant maintenance organization. In my own U.S. Postal Service, there had been talk for years of combining the operations and maintenance supervision and reducing the supervisory ranks. It is easy to say, but how do you do it? Be careful of what you wish for.
They negotiated with their union to change the working condition of “supervision” (changes in hours, wages and working conditions are negotiated contractual obligations) to put the operating equipment technicians under the operations supervisors. In doing so, they split the maintenance craft workforce and established a plant facilities maintenance support function separate from the operations maintenance function.
The facilities function had responsibility for everything but the operating equipment. That included storeroom, custodial, HVAC, all the plant’s infrastructure and the computerized maintenance management system. Work order estimating was done by the facilities planners.
Operations now had control of their own machines, both production and maintenance. The thought was to make teams that could work together and decrease downtime, better identify degradation sooner, and “keep the maintenance employees involved.” In mail-processing plants, there is considerable time spent by maintenance personnel on “area assurance,” of which operations wanted to take advantage.
In a previous article, I discussed the “enabling process design” and focused on the levels of effort and training required for making a change such as this in people’s lives. Rather than tell you the level of effort, I will relate several of the results:

• The supervisors had problems communicating with the technicians and vice versa. The supervisor could add nothing of value to assist the technician when a piece of equipment was down and also did not know how to judge technician performance.
• Supervisors tended to drift toward the operators and avoid the technicians until something broke down. Technicians felt they were subordinated to the operators and felt unappreciated. This led to a reduction of discretionary effort and creativity as it was not recognized.
• The area assurance was misunderstood, and supervisors were uncomfortable for appearing lax toward technicians and pushing the operators. Cooperation between the two factions was less than before the big change.
• The technicians felt disenfranchised, not really belonging. In maintenance, they had camaraderie, mutual support, management that championed them and a home.
• Issues arose over planned work orders between the technicians and the estimators, and between the estimators and the supervisors, with the supervisors trying to understand the now fragmented process for which they used to be a benefactor, but for which now had a part in completing the work order.

This was implemented one plant at a time, and it became evident that maybe a plant-by-plant evaluation should determine the readiness to attempt this change. It resulted in a decision that “one size does not fit all,” and that there could be two approaches: Leave some plants as they are and implement the new structure through a modified process to address the learning from the earlier-on plants. Some early plants reverted back. It also became evident that retrained maintenance supervisors may be more successful in managing a mixed team of operators and technicians.
The lessons are many in this story. I believe that planning for such a change must focus on the roles of each player. I am a believer in getting people to verbally walk through a typical work day as though they were in the new process. This should be done with teams of all involved. Not only should this be early on to beta test a concept, but should be carried forward for all employees involved in every installation.
If you are considering any kind of change, this story is a good beginning for facilitated training sessions on enabling change, along with all of the other process management redesign tools that quality and re-engineering bring to the table.

Duty Standby Regime

In the world of process plant, redundant system is being installed. Equipment such as PLC or Control System runs on a full time online fall back redundancy system. Whereas most mechanical equipment runs on a variety of duty-standby arrangement.

In my view, the most effective duty-standby arrangement has to be judged by the engineer. The question to ask is, what is the dominant failure mode. If it is a random failure mode that is dominating, there is very low risk of increase of failure for switching them every fixed period of time. If the dominant failure mode is in the realm of wear, then one might want to consider off-setting the operational hours so they don't have a perfect storm resulting in plant downtime. If the dominant failure mode is false brinelling, one might want to consider running all the redundant equipment at partial load instead!

Post-Operational Readiness Project (Continuous Improvement)

With the growing world, the mega projects keep coming. With mega projects comes the need for certainty to the investor. In the world of plant maintenance, the certainty comes from Operational Readiness Project. To some, it is a common phase of a project, to some parts of the world, it is an alien that they have never heard before, that includes experienced multinational EPCM contractors.

If you are deciding on the OPEX of a project, and your EPC or EPCM contractor gives you a cost projection that says, oh, it's 3-5% of capital cost. Ask them where that figure comes from, chances are they'll say it's an estimates from historical data. I can also tell you the figure is INCORRECT. Why? It is because your operating cost depends on the quality of your equipment too! Not in linear, or able to be defined by any mathematical algorithm model! It has to be painstakingly compiled, equipment by equipment, building up to the complete plant! A simplified example, a Japanese car OPEX will be very different from a German car OPEX. They have different service intervals, differing coping ability in operating bandwidth & context, difference in material cost, different in complexity. In some cases, higher capital upfront is justifiable! This has to be evaluated on a case by case basis in details.

Planning and budgeting an Operational Readiness to get your master data up to standard, and having all your equipment registered is essential to every process plant. Once up and running, the OEM recommended maintenance plan has to be put in. No, the process does not end here. You need your reliability team to continually manage the plant changes, and it has to update the master data to reflect the changes occur over-time. As the equipment fails in service, reliability engineers need to assess and evaluate your maintenance task to optimize the time and cost for improvement in reliability, increase in production and reduction in cost. This is an on-going task that cannot be neglected.

From experience, a neglected Master Data can cost upwards of $10 million dollars or more to clean up in a brownfield project and a trailing $1 million dollars a year of labour to keep it clean as they go. If a dedicated person acting as the gate-keeper since day 1 at a price of $150,000 a year, imagine how much less money needs to be re-invested to maintain the original business case projected reliability figures!

A lesson for the Executives out there, Operational Readiness does not guarantee you the reliability outcome. Reliability is a culture and an on-going continuous process. Invest in your reliability team!

Reliability Modelling

I have been working full on until New Year building component library for a consultancy and running reliability modelling. I have run into a lot of issues with the model and would like to share them to promote an understanding.

The very first thing you do as an engineer is always question the validity of those data you acquire. In summary, I would not recommend doing reliability modelling. My personal opinion is, it is a waste of time, effort and money. If you are looking at doing reliability modelling, chances are, your existing plant reliability is not great and your reliability knowledge is not comprehensive. For the accuracy you get, you are better off with a 0.9 factor of industry average reliability figure. No modelling out there I have seen is accurate enough for any good use. If you are doubtful on the quality of people you are able to hire into the maintenance team, use a factor of 0.7 and you should have a somewhat conservative availability figure. Yes it looks ugly, yes it looks unrealistically low, but I'm sorry to say, that is reality of the availability and reliability figure you should expect for saving cost hiring cheap people. I could not emphasize enough, good asset management and reliability starts with good people.

Back onto the topic I was suppose to be writing about - Limitations of reliability model. Firstly, ALL reliability model I have seen is designed in series. It is all well and good if your process is in series like a simple production line of a simple mine site, if you have a complicated processing plant, your reliability model will not do. In fact, there's so much work trying to design the model to fit your plant, it is just not worth the effort. Unless there's a free template already setup similar to your plant and takes just a little bit of effort to patch up, there's no point going down this path.

Secondly, in a complex process plant, you will have varying equipment MTBF and MTTR. Every plant's figure is unique. For the model to be accurate enough to be of any use, it has to be from your plant, your production forecast, you historical availability, and reliability. This is because as the errors build up in the reliability model, the final result is again of not much use to you as the owner.

Thirdly, a complex equipment in a complex plant will have a long list of failure modes to prevent. Some of these failure modes will be attended to in one work task and reset their likelihood of occurrence and budgeted life. None of the reliability model I seen cater for this.

With this three fundamental issues in modelling unresolved, I would not recommend any company looking at carrying out the modelling without understanding the limitations of it.