reliable plant September 2006

“It takes many people, doing things right, to keep the stacks smoking, morning through night. ... The hot strip, cold strip and the mills that run plate. Need the deliveries on time, can’t afford...

Whenever a new component is about to be commissioned, the first thing you need to address is the lubricant. A typical original equipment manufacturer’s (OEM) recommendation will usually state...

When making a drive conversion or designing a new power transmission system, maintenance managers and design engineers have three broad options: roller chain drives, V-belt drives and synchronous belt...

Noria Corporation is proud to announce that Reliable Plant magazine won two awards in the 18th annual Writing That Works “Awards for Publication Excellence” (APEX) competition, including one for...

On August 6, British Petroleum ordered the shutdown of the Alaska Pipeline, which supplies approximately 8 percent of the crude oil supply to the United States. The shutdown couldn’t have come at a...

In the Reliability Forum department of Reliable Plant magazine, suppliers provide their insights to a question posed by editor Paul V. Arnold. This issue, the call went out to manufacturers of...

“We have to give up our beef bowls?” Many Japanese citizens lamented when their government imposed a ban on U.S. beef products last year. The reason for public outcry was that the Japanese found...

If you ask any maintenance department how failures can best be prevented, the No. 1 answer is usually that the operations department needs to stop wrecking equipment. If you ask operations how...

A few weeks ago, someone asked me, “How many hours should a maintenance planner plan for each week?” This is a great question, but I can only give a touchy-feely answer. I’m hesitant to push...

A growing trend in industry is to outsource activities considered non-core to the company’s business. This often includes security, facilities maintenance, sanitation and fluid management. But when it comes to lubrication, is contracting out this non-core function an effective strategy? Done properly, with a carefully crafted game plan, success is possible; but the key is “done properly.”

One of the key decisions in predictive maintenance is selecting the right metrics. Why? First off, what gets measured gets improved. Or conversely, what doesn’t get measured never will be improved....

These days, one of the common studies among experts in any field dealing with people is the similarities and differences of the three generations that currently make up a majority of the American...

One of the first responsibilities of leadership (of an organization, company, team or country) is to provide a simple, clear view of what the future can and should look like. Visionary leaders...