We got a call from a major supplier in the maintenance industry the other day who told us that they do not participate in maintenance conferences (SMRP, Vibe Inst, IMC, MARTS etc...) because there is nothing new in maintenance! It seems that we have all been talking about the same old stuff for the past 10 years.

This (marketing) person works for a company that also has had nothing new (as far as I can see) for about the same ten years.

I explained that in my opinion, the "what" of maintenance - the basic elements - are all known now. The challenge is in the implementation and the doing.

Am I missing something? Should we be looking for the NBT (Next Big Thing) to cure all of our maintenance ills or should we focus in using what we know to improve?

Terry O

Some things have changed especially in the Mobile Equipment field. Onboard monitoring systems are being continuously improved ad upgraded to be expert systems.
The area that I see lacks the most focus is operator knowledge and training along with operating standards and conditions. Most KPI's that maintenance sets to measure itself on are very much impacted by the Operations. For example lets take mining and Heavy hauler fleets. Haul road design, shovel matching, nominal load management, road condition, grade management, dumping strategies, rewards for production, operator knowledge of on board systems and how their practices affect truck reliability are some key drivers that affect maintenance in Mean Time Between Stoppages, costs to repair, Mean Time To Repair, life cycle management etc. It is difficult to identify or defend the position that operational practices and conditions are the causes for unattainment of benchmarks or targets without alot of "maintenance energy" expended. I believe that for the most part maintenance actually has a smaller part to play in equipment reliability as compared to operations

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Bob Konowalec,

Terry,

For what its worth I believe that there are a lot of new things in Maintenance. Many are a version on previous themes, but there are definitely new avenues of opportunity opening up for asset-intensive corporations in particular throughout the world.

I have to agree with the comments made to you however, for the longest time people have been talking about similar themes throughout the maintenance seminar world. Normally, as you rightly point out, there are different variations on the "how to" side of things with respect to implementation or slight modifications to existing practices or methods. (I think that another issue is that we are frequently preaching to the converted, not the easiest method of getting the message out there.)

I think that the following items, in order of importance (in my opinion), are new pathways for maintenance managers:

1. A greater understanding of the role of "maintenance" in the wider context of asset management. Particularly with respect to tying measures on operational expenses to capital investment, and understanding the effects of this on the true whole-of-life picture. (The one that allows for risk based decisions)

2. A greater inclusion of risk based methods and techniques. (Rather than merely within the high-risk industries where it is part of everyday life) This is often taken to mean a growing reliance on stochastic (probabilistic) analyses, however many industries with large asset bases do not generate the sort nor the amount of data to enable this. This initially fed a lot of decision support tools, however as the realisation regarding some of the potential flaws of these tools is surfacing other methods are being sourced and created.

2(a). An understanding of the effects of human error. This has been greatly influenced by James reason during recent time. I think that the inclusion of this thinking within the failure management of assets, operations and maintenance, is one of the waves of change that are washing through industry at present.

3. A growing acceptance that performance measurement is a means of creating and implementing strategy rather than merely monitoring and correcting performance. (Not new in a global context, but late coming to the world of asset management)

4. A huge amount of focus towards areas of advanced technology such as knowledge engineering. (I think that these "smart" systems that are capable of actually learning will become the "Next Big Thing" as you put it. Particularly given the advances in existing areas such as On-board monitoring for mobile and online monitoring for fixed (and distributed) asset types.

5. A great deal of focus on what can only be termed as the "Asset Information Portfolio". That is, the exact types of information on the exact types of assets, within their operating context, that will support and inform decision making throughout the physical asset base.

6. Technological advances such as wireless and the way that it is enabling greater data collection throughout the world. For example, today a technological roadmap for a large-scale corporation could include wireless technology, online monitoring, and (most interestingly) "remote control". The last of these refers to the efforts of many organizations to use information management systems, combined with online monitoring, decision support and knowledge engineering tools, are enabling organizations to transfer the control of their operations globally to central areas. Allowing for great levels of efficiency increases.

These issues are not in the vein of previous advances which were "at the coal face" and able to be adapted from the technician through to the engineer. Rather they are advances that have been bought about by the dramatic benefit to asset management of the technological leap during the 1990's.

My 2 c worth, I hope it’s of interest. I obviously find this whole area of emerging technologies and trends in asset management to be a fascinating area.

Kind regards

Daryl Mather
www.strategic-advantages.com

Alright - of course there is always something new!

Great path information Daryl.

One thing for sure - the context in which maintenance and reliability are held as it relates to asset management, the business side etc..is becoming more mainstream.

I also have to revert to the plants I visit or the people I speak with who work at plants that have almost no formalized maintenance. On one hand - they are probably the best candidates for the "new" thinking in maintenance you refer to. On the other hand - these plants could derive tremendous benefit from simply starting with the basics and building from there.


Terry O

terry,

I can't disagree with that point at all. "Some is better than none" is always a good message. In fact up until recently many of my clients and contacts were working on a "back to basics" type mentality to ensure they were doing the basics right after having gone off onto areas like ERP without having solid foundation.

Another point, that I think is very relevant, is that many organizations have lost touch with some of the basics as a result of skill drainage during the restructuring and rationalization that was rampant during the 90's.

While this supports a "back to basics" approach, it also shows that the scope for traditional cost reductions (reductions of people and materials as well as increases in uptime) is becoming limited. So increases in net present value in the future is going to have to be made through more sophisticated approaches to extracting economic value.

So, while I wouldnt ever be negative about getting the basics right, there is a strong argument for trying to advance as quickly as possible. The competitive world around us is not going to wait for many organizations.

As I understand things, and I am not too sure about this one, the USA is currently feeling a lot of pain from opening economic borders in the manufacturing sector. If jobs are to be retained, then the investment to make large leaps in performance through sophisticated methods may be one of the only options remaining for many US manufacturing firms. (As opposed to the investment required to set up offshore)

It is simply impossible to compete on cost of production without leveraging technology, and doing so faster and better than the off-shore competitor can.

Sorry for raving on, I hope it is of interest.

Daryl Mather
www.strategic-advantages.com

If I remember correctly, in 1995 8 bit processors and argon cooled IR cameras were all the rage. . .

Was that just 10 years ago? Man time does fly!

Terry O

Terry, you know there's nothing new in golf. We're still using the same clubs, and playing on the same courses. Oh sure, they may have changed from "wood" woods to metal, blades to cavity backs, and all the fancy putters, not to mention changes in ball design, but there's nothing "new".

But people still play!

Chips are better, accels are better, technology is better, people are still finding new applications to help companies become more efficient, and

we're still "playing"!

I still trying to become the Tiger Woods of reliability!

What a closed mind! I have never been to a maintenance/reliability conference where I have not learnt something worthwhile. At a rough count, I must have been to about 30 of them (and spoken at most, too).

Often, I get bright ideas triggered off from a speaker who may be talking on something else!

I come home with lots of notes. Admittedly, as I am now an academic, my reasons for learning may be different from my 28 years in fossil power generation.... but you meet lots of interesting people who pass on good ideas outside the formal sessions.

Ray Beebe

Vendor
I am sorry but I can´t hold myself, normally I don´t argue my products unless I am asked but I can´t help it this time, don´t read it or erase it if you are offended. Look at this link as one of the few steps forward the last 10 years. You must have data at a cost effective and humanly useable level to make decisions, look here for the solution: http://www.vtab.se/pages/eng/product/me72.html
and look here at our webshop, Swedens first for Vibe opened today to find what you need.
http://www.conditech.com/catalog/
Olov

This message has been edited. Last edited by: OLI,

Well, I shot one of those golfs - but no matter how long I boiled it - the thing was so tough I chipped a tooth. Ain't wastin' no-mo ammo!

Tiger Woods of Reliability! That is great! Now if you can just match the mega-earnings and the super model wife - you would have it made!

Great points from Sam and Ray as well.

I guess I was just miffed about the comment that the vendor made about nothing new at the conferences she attended and I equated that to the search for the ever elusive silver bullet so many are seeking. I guess I should keep my mind open to the fact that technology and innovation may actually deliver some of those silver bullets!

Of course no one knows it all and we can all learn things that are new to us.

Terry O

In the vibration field,the material evolved considerably these last years.We passed from simple measurements of global levels to all the possibilities offered by the Fourier analysis and the digital processing of the signal: spectrums with multiple resolution, high resolution zooms, cepstrums, amplitude demodulation,numerical filtering, etc…

But with the knowledge and the experiment necessary to the definition of these indicators for making vibration routes, we're facing a basic problem: the increase in times of acquisition and exploitation, and thus in the increase in the costs of monitoring. The guiding principle of the current data is to carry out an acquisition of the time signal for each indicator. In other words, if you decide to supervise a relatively complex multi-speed machine with a score of indicators, you must repeat twenty times the acquisition of the vibratory signal and that for only one machine!

Then, which could be the new trend? Give up the concept of the "data collector" to develop that of "signal collector"? Is it enough to acquire some timewave signals correctly sampled,over one sufficient duration,and then carry out all post-processings necessary with a performing software? With only one minute of signal, therefore only one minute of acquisition,one can make hundreds of different treatments?

Rusty, I see the same in Europe, 100% correct.

Well Alec, the difference came with portable collectors in like 1986, little have happened since, in 20 years, more lines, more bells and whistles, part from Demod that was a step forward, 10+ years ago.... I think that the next step is human friendly systems that in principle anybody can use out of the box if he can find his way to the machine and that have such software support that for normal basic faults you get all info you need w/o being required to be a rocket scientist. You should then by the supplier or any selected friendly have the backup support to get help with the last 10% nasty problems. Personally I have a strong demand to see the FFT I collect but my resellers say that is not the case in the US so I made that possible to turn off..... In the US they say it´s only the "results" that count, hm, so you get the results you are asking for? But I store the raw data to be analyzed as anybody likes in the PC. This is not a dark magic exorcized by magicians, it is some common sense and good tools and good support! I also see in front of me complete tool kits for alignment, balancing, vibration, IR, motor analysis, to a reasonable cost based on volume market hardware.
I will now step down from my soap box, must be a day for that, sorry, I have filled out my income tax form today...... Thank´s for reading, now you know what I am trying to do and what I believe in, and it´s not Santa. Olov
www.vibrationsteknik.com

This message has been edited. Last edited by: OLI,

I see two trends that are somewhat disturbing. 1) A loss of "wrench skills" as younger, less experienced maintenance people come onboard. 2) A lack of "technical horsepower" in many older guys who are good with the wrenches.

The young guys are eager to adopt new technologies, as long as there's not too much "work" involved. And the older guys would rather just keep doing it "the way we've always done it" even if it means continuing to work harder than they have to.

These two groups may well be the "exceptions to the rule" but they are a significant percentage of the work force. The older generation that has now exited the work force, developed their work ethics during and after WWII. I think that we are going to suffer even more as their sons & daughters, to whom they passed along their values, begin leaving the workforce in 10 - 20 years.

Technology is important, but someone still has to do the hard work of maintenance. Are we going to have enough willing and able bodies to do that?

I guess the NBT (Next Big Thing) for maintenance & reliability is the quest to contribute considerably to achievement of best in class/ world class/ top quartile performance organization because maintenance is normally the biggest budget spender. In order to do so, what would be the best/optimised action plan from maint & reliability's view point? A friend of mine joked the other day, asking what is the best recipe for not only maint & reliability but the whole organization?

I believe maintenance can't do much without involvement by operations & technical depts plus materials/contracts, finance & HRM depts and reliability should be the cross-functional dept linking all parts of an organization to provide a holistic/life cycle approach for asset management ie "from womb to grave". I see some organizations are on the leading edge especially pacesetters but others are lagging behind. Those who are satisfied with the status quo will be left behind. I see organizations including maintenance depts in them are moving towards knowledge/intelligence-driven culture for achieving high competiveness in a globalized world. I think the main three ingredients for the most delicious recipe would at least comprise reliable physical asset, competent human asset and effective work processes. It's just my humble visionary dream last nite. TQ

Terrence,

Perhaps the 'Boiled Frog' syndrome makes us believe there is no change at all. A lot of break-through as well as creeping changes have taken place over the last 30-40 years. Some of it was dramatic, e.g., when RCM and TPM were introduced, others were more gradual, e.g., PC power applied to hand-held cameras, detectors, vibration probes, digital cameras etc. There was a time when I recall having to wait for the vibe tape to be sent for analysis. It took a week to get the orbit, bode, spectrum and waterfall plots. We take such analysis done on-stream for granted today. Similarly, fibre-optic scopes and ultrasonic devices with PC enhancements have revolutionized data recording and tracking, improving detectability and prediction capability by an order of magnitude. A thriving CBM industry is now in place, again unthinkable as an industry 40 years ago.

Similarly, data transmission for remote anlysis
over the internet is taken as a given, while a decade or so ago, only the nerds could even think of such flights of imagination. Business performance is now far more transparent with ERM/EAMs as against stand-alone CMMS or paper based work management systems. Maintainers are being judged against their business performance rather than how hard they work.

Coming to physical effort items, on-line Relief Valve testing, with PC based tracking has come of age. Bolt-tensioning is now much more prevalent than, say, 20 years ago. Hydraulic torquing tools and strong-arms are fairly common. Laser alignment tools have speeded up and improved the quality of shaft alignment.

Lastly, change for the sake of change should not be our goal. What works well is best retained, not changed.

One thing that has changed is that maintainers appreciate the role of people and human reliability a lot more than, say 30-40 years ago. We do not employ 'hands' any more, we use the 'brains' that come with the 'hands' as well.

Apologies for this long post. I am just trying to put things in perspective.

V.Narayan.

Just my opinion, but I believe that a significant part of the problem is that there are too many variations of the 'same thing' that are being presented as religion. The minds within the maintenance community have generated a 'maintenance speak' (ie: RCM language, etc.) that is about as comprehensible to the layman as has been computer programmer speak. It appears that many of us have forgotten that all of these technologies and programs are 'tools' for programs and need to be mixed and matched depending upon the situation.

Even if a technology has not made major strides in several decades, the fact that the technology or concept survives is a testimony to its importance. Additionally, even older technologies still require research into their application with new systems and easier presentation. The concepts may not have improved, but, as stated in numerous responses, the methods have.

The key to success right now is teaching the professionals entering our industry as to the tools that they have available to do their jobs. In addition, the knowledge of the maintenance community that is leaving has to be captured and made available. Because, even though insulation to ground testing, for instance, has been around for over a century, I am getting a growing number of questions related to how to perform this 'simple' task and what it means.

Lets get back to basics.