The Benefits Of Condition Monitoring Of Plant Machinery

By Author: John Cory
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Condition monitoring is the process of monitoring a machine and its parameters in order to predict machine deterioration and failure before it happens. It is a major part of the different processes that comprises predictive maintenance, and it provides the opportunity for machinery maintenance professionals to be proactive rather than reactive with regard to machinery breakdown. This type of proactive care is essential in every industry because the downtime caused by machine failure can lead to significant loss in production and profit.

The primary purpose of condition monitoring is to detect equipment problems and forthcoming machine failure long before it occurs. Plant engineers can obtain decisive information about the state and health of the machinery from such regular monitoring. It is performed by obtaining frequent data on key indicators of machine condition such as lubricants like oil, emissions of gases, metal wear, vibrations, noise and temperature. Trends in the collected data are then scrutinized for any deviations from the reference to indicate impending faults.

This process allows for plant ...
... personnel to intercede before the breakdown occurs by arranging maintenance, requisitioning of any required parts and conducting any necessary repairs. Such early intervention is more cost effective than unplanned outages caused by machine failure and also has the value of extending the life of the machinery. Other benefits of this practice including savings on repair and maintenance costs and optimization of machine performance.

Condition monitoring may be done either with online machine monitoring systems that collect data while the machine is operating or by the utilization of offline systems like handheld or portable data collection equipment. Online monitoring systems measure the necessary factors with the help of an embedded tool such as a sensor or a scanner and the data collected are then sent to a main server for analysis. Offline systems include handheld measurement appliance that technicians use to record data at frequent intervals or portable data collection device that is permanently attached to the plant machinery. Many companies offer condition monitoring services such as on-site and off-site services. They will be able to outfit your plant with the monitoring systems, sensors, scanners, alarms and the software necessary to analyze the data.

The processes used in predictive maintenance seek to predict the ideal cost-effective time to timetable maintenance; however, they are not capable of predicting actual equipment failure. Condition monitoring on the other hand can predict equipment failure, save valuable production time and prevent costly repairs.
Enabling you to control the risk please visit condition monitoring or magnetometers. Thanks to Ashley G. Deaton for sharing his ideas on this topic.