I’m sure you have heard how important precision maintenance is to the health of your equipment, but have you ever seen the real impact it has? Recently, to show this point within my company, we did some training to demonstrate how restoring a machine into a precision state can make a real difference.
We divided a training class into five groups. Each group focused on bearing installation, alignment, fastener torquing, balancing, belt alignment, and other precision maintenance practices on machinery. The chart shows the impact of precision maintenance and why it is so important. Notice how the vibration, temperature, and amperage was reduced as each machine was brought into a precision operating state.
Red values are the as-found measurements for each machine/group and green is the as-left condition after the precision maintenance activities were completed. These were not large machines, but this clearly shows how taking a little extra time and care with equipment will reduce the operational stresses, reduce wear and failure conditions, save energy and improve reliability.
Often we focus much of our time on defect identification, planning, scheduling and elimination (repair) of equipment defects. These practices must be executed properly. However, we tend to overlook the importance of restoring and keeping our equipment in a precision operating state so defects are not created in the first place.
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Related Blog: What is your company’s definition of “Maintenance”?
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Articles and Case Studies by Trent Phillips CRL CMRP - Novelis