Your Reliability Engineering Professional Development Site
A listing in reverse chronological order of these article series:
Many explosions in the processing, manufacturing and bulk materials handling industries involve flammable gases or vapours and explosive dusts or fibres. Such chemicals are known as hazardous materials. This article provides a basic overview of the design requirements for hazardous areas.
Having visited hundreds of manufacturing plants in the last 17 years, someone recently asked me if there were any traits the most reliable plants all had in common. I have listed below the top 6 signs of a reliable plant. [Read more…]
This article covers the operation of steam traps and how they work. Steam is a greatly used medium. Its use ranges from heating process and domestic fluids through to driving turbines by the expansion of the vapour. Yet the steam trap at the bottom of a drop leg is easily forgotten. [Read more…]
I’ve been told that humor, especially New York sarcasm doesn’t go over too well on LinkedIn. That as a regular contributor of articles, blog postings and hopefully useful updates one should try avoid attempting to use humor as a teaching tool.
Well those who know me well know I also don’t always follow the advice of those who somehow believe we all learn the same way, think the same way and therefore do things the same way. I’m a guy who believes that while common sense might not be that common, when you explain why something makes sense most of the audience will get it. For the others who still don’t understand I of course bring data.
When in solution (dissolved in water) the molecules of an acid or a base dissociate (disunite) into a mix of component parts and the full molecule. The components are electrically charged + or – ions. Ions are unstable and ‘want’ to bond chemically to become stable. In strong acids and bases many ions are present, making them reactive and dangerous. [Read more…]
Yet another example of why it’s important to understand the failure modes that make your system vulnerable to complete shutdown. Delta Airlines is learning this lesson the hard way today after having to inform customers around the world that all of its flights would be on hold or even canceled due to a “system wide outage”.
Delta listed the cause for the outage as a power failure near its world-wide office location in Atlanta, Georgia while those at Georgia Power believe it was the failure of Delta’s equipment that caused the power outage.
While each company points the finger at the other, the reality is Delta’s customers around the world are sitting at airports or at home wondering when the problems will be resolved and when Delta will be able to accommodate their travel needs.
Life cycle costing (LCC) is a way of analysing equipment purchase choices. If the analysis is done right and all factors are addressed, and the information is good, you would select the item that cost the least amount to own (buy and use) over its working life. This piece of equipment when compared to other suitable items would perform its lifetime service at least total cost to the organisation. [Read more…]
A few months back, I wrote a blog resulting from a conversation I had with a group of Maintenance Technicians who were attending the International Maintenance Conference (IMC) in 2011. While the group was enjoying the conference and learning some new things, the general consensus was that they felt they would not be able to apply the tools and techniques they were learning because “management will say they support reliability, but when it comes right down to it, talk is cheap.”
Properly designed o-ring grooves and properly installed o-rings stop the passage of pressurised liquids or gasses. Flexibility while being deformed under pressure is their greatest sealing advantage. O-Ring Design and Materials O-rings are made of elastomeric materials such as rubbers and plastics. They deform under pressure and then return back to their original shape once the pressure is removed. They also accept the movement of mirror-finish shafts while deformed by pressure. Usually they are shaped like a rubber elastic band of round cross section, but they can have rectangular, trapezoid and even ‘+’ shapes depending on the application. The material, internal diameter (ID) and cross section diameter specify o-rings of round cross section. [Read more…]
One of our customers who is thinking about setting up a RCM Blitz™ Facilitator training class recently asked me if I had a list of traits that all good RCM facilitators seem to have? He also wanted to know the background experience a good facilitator would have and what are some the qualities we should look for in selecting these people?
As I was about to tell him I could e-mail a document I had created on how to select a good RCM Facilitator, an interesting thought came to mind.
Are you really looking for someone to become a good facilitator or would you really like them a great facilitator? [Read more…]
A cooling water tower (CWT) is used to remove heat from incoming hot water and reduce it to a lower temperature. It does that by evaporating off some of the hot water. The evaporated water takes away the heat. Exactly the same process occurs when your body sweets to keep you cool. You cool off even faster if there is a breeze blowing. [Read more…]
20 years ago, I began my first assignment as a Reliability Engineer at Eastman Kodak’s Photo Chemical facility in Rochester, New York. Now, I understand that I just lost several people who began reading this article by using the words “photo” and “chemical” in the same sentence, but 20 years ago, most photography was still a chemical process. [Read more…]
Safety showers and eyewash stations are installed when dangerous goods are present. The shower installation has to meet recognised standards like American National Standard Z385.1. This article notes the key requirements for safety shower installations and discusses some practical issues. [Read more…]
One of the most common mistakes I see at plants and manufacturing facilities around the world is centered on the lack of a good lubrication program. For whatever reason, the task of lubricating equipment in most companies has been traditionally viewed as menial but necessary and delegated to low skill level employees with little or no training in lubrication best practices. It is this type of thinking that results in the unexpected failure of rotating equipment, including, pumps, motors, gearboxes, and bearings. Worse yet are the companies that have no lubrication program at all and somehow believe that someone in the plant will lubricate the equipment when it needs it. Just leave a few grease guns and some oil drums around the site and people will know when to add some. [Read more…]
Static electricity is the build-up of opposite polarity (positive and negative) electrical charges on two different substances in contact by the movement of one surface across the other. The spark that can occur from static build-up is the result of the opposite charges neutralising themselves when the electrical field between them becomes strong enough to overcome the gap resistance. [Read more…]