Try this simple experiment. With notepad in hand, go out into your plant and walk around a sampling of your most critical machines. These are the ones that have high probability of failure and/or...
Recently, I was sitting in my office at home when I heard a knock on my front door. Opening the door, I was pleased to see a FedEx delivery driver standing with the package I'd been waiting on for...
Are we approaching an energy crisis? As I write this column, crude oil has hit record prices, again, with gas prices at the pump sure to follow. Meanwhile, debate concerning two major issues, peak...
The topic of oil "life: is important to keep at the forefront of the industry conversations today. It is still surprisingly common to hear people today say, "oil doesn't go bad, it just gets dirty." Such a statement implies that simply removing "dirt" from oil will make it last forever, but this is not true.
It is widely accepted that oil contamination is one of the major causes of component failure. When practicing proactive maintenance, it therefore makes sense to give oil cleanliness a high...
Proper lubrication of rolling bearings in rotating equipment involves delivering the right lubricant, in the right quantity, to the right location. Advanced lubricant-dispensing technologies, some...
Whether producing weapons, foods, medicines or the wide spectrum of lubricating fluids, centrifuges have successfully performed their superior separating duties for many decades. A bypass...
I visited a chemical manufacturing plant that used three three-cylinder reciprocating compressors. The machines had a long history (approximately 20 years) of intensive maintenance, but...
The ease of maintenance and extended service intervals are major selling points for filtration systems. The challenge in achieving these marks of quality lies in developing solutions that will be easy...
Looking for a grease expert? The best means of ensuring quality of professional services or products are through certification programs. The National Lubricating Grease Institute (NLGI)...
On March 6, 24 Italian practitioners sat for ICML's first Italian MLT I exam - Tecnico addetto alla lubrificazione di macchine - at the Italian School of Maintenance (Scuola Italiana di...
Most greases produced today use mineral oil as their fluid components. These mineral oil-based greases typically provide satisfactory performance in most industrial applications. In temperat…