SOLUTIONS AND APPLICATIONS / Predictive Maintenance Services for Your Rotating Equipment

Failure and downtime can happen in every manufacturing environment every single day especially for the equipment that performs repetitive tasks. This issue brings up the need for production in manufacturing to be both efficient and consistent in quality for today’s market.

With greater connectivity and competition, maintenance operation became significant in the company to ensure that the company can stay competitive in the market. Any unscheduled downtime in production can cause delays which may lead to unhappy customers. When customers are unhappy, they could source for goods at the competitor and this will ultimately impact the company’s bottom line.

Predictive maintenance (PdM) is a method for anticipating maintenance requirements in machines at the factory floor. By analysing operational data from the machines, patterns emerge that will allow operators to develop an understanding of failure modes and predict when maintenance will be required on any given unit; allowing for it to be planned during less-costly times.



Customer Challenges:

A long and unexpected machine shut-down will not only bring huge losses to the company by affecting business operation, but it also affects the company’s reputation and image in the customer’s perspective.

In fact, it will also increase the expenses where the company needs to pay extra charges to the maintenance staff for overtime and repair costs.

The safety of employees as top priority in the operation flow is a challenge especially in the hazardous working environment. The worker’s safety is threatened when there is no preventive maintenance because injuries and accidents can happen anytime.

Unimaginable losses to the company can occur when the broken machine affects the quality of the production output and this will become a main concern for the company.


XtructureD Solutions: Predictive Maintenance Services

KVC predictive maintenance services includes vibration analysis, infrared thermography and acoustic monitoring on rotating equipment:

Vibration Analysis is a monitoring process to detect the levels and pattern of vibration signature in the machinery. It helps to analyse the health of the machines and their components as well as detect abnormal vibration event and evaluate the machine condition.

Infrared (IR) Thermography is also known as IR testing, thermal testing, thermal imaging and IR thermometry which is a non-destructive testing to check and measure the machines or equipment status with heat patterns. IR Thermography analyses spikes in temperature which helps in early fault detection. It can also monitor and measure temperature in equipment such as motors, bearings, or other friction surfaces and help uncover "hot spots" in electrical cabinets and detect insulation failure. The monitoring platform can store and analyse these images to detect problems and identify trends under specific conditions.

Acoustic Monitoring uses high-frequency signals to determine the equipment's condition. The same principle can be applied using airborne sound (Air/Gas Leak). By capturing these acoustic noises, breakdowns can be detected. Advanced machine learning algorithms are used to improve the predictive capability over time. These analytics can be combined with other monitoring technologies to drill down and uncover anomalies before they occur.


Benefits

Predictive maintenance solutions can reduce more than 50% of the maintenance cost which includes labour cost, maintenance activity as well as the required replacement parts. It shortens the maintenance time and parts needed for repair by understanding the status of the equipment before the machine breaks down. The ability to pre-determine defective parts in need of repair, tools and required labour skills ensure a reduction in both repair time and cost. The cost incurred with the stocking of spare parts can be reduced by more than 30% as industrial plant have enough time to purchase the replacement parts needed.

Regular monitoring of the equipment actual condition and process system can reduce the number of unexpected and catastrophic equipment failures. Consistent monitoring and analysis of machine condition can identify the specific faulty components and enable maintenance personnel to plan each repair without affecting the daily operation. A complete predictive program, which includes process parameter monitoring, can also improve the operating efficiency and productivity of processing plants.

Preventing catastrophic failures and early detection of machine and system problems increase the service life of industrial plant machinery by an average of 30%. The increase in machine service life is a projection based on five years of operation after implementing a predictive maintenance program. The calculation includes: frequency of repairs, severity of machine damage and the actual condition of the machinery after repairs. A condition-based predictive maintenance program avoids serious damage to equipment as well as other plant systems. The reduction in the severity of damages increases the service life of plant equipment, in addition to preventing the propagation of defects.

A side benefit of predictive maintenance is the automatic ability to estimate the mean time between failures (MTBF). This statistic provides the means to determine the most cost-effective time to replace the machinery, rather than continually absorbing the high maintenance costs. The MTBF of plant equipment is reduced every time a major repair or reconditioning occurs. Predictive maintenance will automatically reduce the MTBF over the service life of the machine. When the MTBF reaches the point where maintenance and continuing operation costs exceed replacement costs, the machine should be replaced.


Featured Products




FLUKE tis75+ Thermal Imager Manual Focus 9HZ

Take your plan for a proactive maintenance (PM) program and turn it into reality. To get started, you need features that make it easy to set up your image organization and inspection routines. With the TiS75+ you’re well on your way to implementing a successful PM program. It comes with rugged hard carrying case with soft transport bag and adjustable hand strap.



SKF Quick Collect Sensor

The SKF QuickCollect sensor is an easy-to-use bluetooth enabled handheld sensor that connects to iOS and Android apps on your tablet, smartphone, or smartwatch (iOS only). Combining vibration and temperature sensing, overall data can be viewed on the spot in real-time or pushed to the cloud for future analysis.



FLUKE Sonic Industrial Imager

Equipped with an array of microphones for an expanded field-of-view, the handheld Fluke ii900 Sonic Industrial Imager enables maintenance teams to quickly and accurately locate air, gas and vacuum leaks in compressed air systems; even in noisy environments. Specifically designed for noisy production facilities the new SoundSight™ technology is simple to learn and easy to implement. The 7” LCD touchscreen overlays a SoundMap™ on a visual image for quick leak location identification. The straightforward, intuitive interface allows technicians to isolate the sound frequency of the leak to filter out loud background noise. In a matter of hours, the team can inspect the entire plant – during peak operations. For the first time, you can quickly and easily identify the air leak repairs needed to ensure efficient operations and reduce utility bills. Images can be saved and exported for reporting purposes. Never leave air leaks unattended again.

Featured Products