Have you ever heard someone say: "Something is wrong with this machine; it's making a funny noise" or "It's running rough." It is natural to associate a machines condition with the level of noise or vibration it makes. So if it shakes or rattles more than usual, we begin to suspect mechanical trouble. Well that is time House of Balance should be notified.
The
idea of relating a machines condition with the level of vibration is not a new
one. Since the mid 1950's, the measurement and analysis of vibration has
become increasingly useful technique for controlling machinery conditions.
It is natural for all machine to vibrate. Even machines in excellent
condition will have some vibration because of minor variations in manufacturing
tolerances. Therefore, each machine, whether it's a 10,000 RPM compressor,
stem turbine generator, a lathe or a vacuum cleaner, will have a level of
vibration, which may be regarded as normal or inherent.
Acceptable machinery vibration levels just do not increase or become excessive for no reason at all. Something causes the vibration, such as unbalance, looseness, misalignment, bearings, etc. Each mechanical defect generates vibration in its own unique way. This makes it possible to positively identify a mechanical problem by simply measuring and noting its vibration characteristics. If you are participating in a carefully conducted Predictive Maintenance program, you can learn to recognize small increases in vibration, and interpret the machines vibration "signature" long before the defective component will actually fail.
The continued success of a company often depends on safe and productive operation of rotating machinery. An effective Predictive Maintenance Program is vital to this kind of success. The quality of your company's maintenance program determines how long a machine operates problem free, how safe they are for the people working around them, and how productive the machine is.
A Predictive Maintenance program allows the machinery to run continuously until you detect the earliest stages of the problem. This often means that you can run the machine for much longer periods of time than a preventive maintenance schedule would allow. This means that your company can reduce its long term capital investment in new machinery, while maintaining the same level and quality of production.
A
first rate Predictive Maintenance program can prevent unexpected breakdowns,
allowing you to schedule a maintenance shutdown at a time when it will have
minimal effect on normal operations. This also permits a work schedule
to be prepared, together with the requirements for manpower, tools and
replacement parts. The repair time can also be kept to a minimum,
resulting in less machinery downtime and reducing the amount of standby
machinery required to maintain operations in the event of unexpected
breakdown.
As you can see, an effective Predictive Maintenance program is a program of detection, analysis , and correction. The program first helps you to detect the onset of a problem, the means for analyzing the problem to determine the cause, and finally it puts you in a position to correct the problem before the failure actually occurs.
House of Balance primary focus is the control and elimination of vibration problems. With the PM Program that we have in place, our nationally certified vibration analysts come to your facility and collect vibration data with our C.S.I. portable data collector, on all bearings
associated with a particular assembly, in three planes (horizontal, vertical, axial). After the data collection process, we then download the vibration spectrums into our computer system , where our certified technician analyzes the vibration signatures to see if the vibration meets or exceeds ISO standards. If the vibration exceeds ISO standards, we then document the root cause of the vibration, along with the measures required to eliminate the vibration, well before failure would occur.
Predictive Maintenance is a practical and necessary business function that provides proven results. A managed and thorough predictive maintenance program increases production capacity, significant reduction in unnecessary costs, improved product quality , safety and extended machinery life. Facilities that participate in a Predictive Maintenance program, greatly reduces downtime as a result of machine failure. This P/M program will detect early failures in high priority equipment before production is affected.
If you have any question or would be interested in setting up a Predictive Maintenance Program, please call or e-mail us and we will get back to you.