Keeping Good Parts Good

When it comes to inventory availability, it’s important to have the right parts in like-new condition to best support maintenance operations. The standard used by many is the same method that the Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEM’s) and distributors use to store spare parts.
The location where some spare parts are stored is critical to meeting the “ready to use” requirement. Minimizing the effects of temperature and humidity is basic, but the protection of parts against the effects of handling during cycle counts and normal store room movements is also a contributor. When possible, it is favorable to have vendors keep the spare parts on their shelves and use a “Just In Time” delivery agreement for access. When not possible, precautions must be taken. Parts that are not in prime condition for use are just as detrimental as no parts at all.
Table 1 shows several types of parts kept in most warehouses or unit locations that need special attention and the category of environmental hazard for these parts.


Electrical Parts.
For many electrical parts, particularly parts with circuit boards, the three main environmental hazards that need to be guarded against are temperature, humidity and Electro Static Discharge (ESD).
During the last twenty years, the nature of electronics used in running a manufacturing plant has changed through the use of more advanced computer controlled equipment.  This equipment relies on the use of printed circuit boards that require a low humidity environment with little fluctuation in temperature.  Changes in temperature and humidity can cause the micro connections between the components and the printed circuit board to separate or warp.  These components are also subject to short circuits from small amounts of voltage, the source of which can be as small as a micro-discharge from the person holding the part.  For this reason, these electronic parts must be kept in their special ESD packages, usually a black bag made of non-conductive material originally supplied by the manufacturer.  These parts can be so sensitive that even when ESD parts are removed from their special package, the handling person should be grounded using a specially designed ground strap to avoid ESD damage.
Figure 1 is a picture of a typical electrical assembly properly packaged in an ESD bag and enclosed in a custom fit foam container. All employees should be alerted to “black-bag” parts and the caution required to keep them functional.

Belts and Hoses.
Belts and hoses are subject to degradation over time from the affects of UV light, heat, cold and humidity.  Unfortunately, there are no black or silver EDC bags to alert users of belts and few plants accurately date or rotate belts and hoses when aging occurs. Since many of the hoses and belts kept in a store room are an insurance spare, these parts may not have a high turnover.  When possible, it is best to allow the part supplier to keep these in their environmentally controlled warehouse.  This will ensure fresh parts are available for use when needed.  If not possible to keep the parts at the distributors’ warehouse, belts and hoses should be stored in an environment that is air conditioned in the summer and heated in the winter and not in direct sunlight. The store room should apply First In, First Out (FIFO) stocking practices so that the oldest parts are used first. In extreme cases, a lifecycle approach may recommend discarding and replacing dated belts and hoses after x number of years. We also recommends the use of flat storage wherever possible and hanging storage only with appropriate fully supportive fixtures.
Figure 2 shows properly stored gaskets.


Electric Motors.
Electric motors offer another possibility for degradation due to humidity, temperature extremes and vibration.  All motors should be kept in the same low humidity and stable temperature environment as belts and hoses, but they also require regular shaft turning to avoid low spots on the armature and coils and damage to the bearings from false Brinelling.  Motor turning can be managed through the use of tags attached to each motor that show the last turn date similar to the inspection date on a fire extinguisher.  Electric motors with horsepower greater than 25 should be kept heated through the use of electric heaters. This will prevent shrinkage and expansion from the effects of cold and heat on any metal parts that have different coefficients of shrinkage during temperature fluctuations.
Figure 3 displays an electric motor stored in a low humidity, heated and cooled warehouse.  Note the numbers on the motor used to align and indicate position on the shaft key way after rotation.  The date and position of rotation is also noted on the blue tag affixed to the motor.  The motor is bolted to a wooden skid to lessen area vibrations and ease movement

Summary.
It is important to recognize many of the parts kept in a maintenance store room can be subject to degradation and damage from the effects of the environment and improper handling or storage techniques.  Keeping unknown defective parts on the shelf for emergencies will compound a break down when the defective part is installed and subsequently removed/replaced because of improper storage.  Whenever possible, the use of the distributor’s stock should be used as this stock is turned over more frequently than the plants’ stores stock.  Typically, distributors and manufacturers are more likely to keep parts in their stores under tight environmental and handling controls.
If keeping parts on-site, keep them on-site correctly! Hidden damage is worse than known damage and will cost the site more in the log run.

Thanksgiving Leftovers and Lower Cost Reliability

What if after the Thanksgiving feast you just stuck the leftover food in your china cabinet until the next time you wanted them. This sounds crazy yet many times after plant outages when kitted work is completed the left overs are crammed into a tool box or under a desk in an office. A tool box is no more a suitable storage place for left over parts than a china cabinet is for left over turkey and potato salad. When you are done with the turkey it goes into the refrigerator and when you have leftover parts they should be returned to the maintenance store room where their quality can be verified and they can be preserved in a controlled environment. 

The questions are:

Do you have a "parts return to stores" process?

Does it make returns easy to prevent "squirreling" of parts on the shop floor?

Does it insure quality parts are kept in stores and damaged parts are disposed of?

In the end we want to prevent spoilage and insure that the part and the turkey provides maximum health and reliability and not infant mortality. This way of thinking will get us a lower cost level of reliability now.

Don’t Start Up In a Bad Way: Five Ways to Limit the Creation of a Reactive Culture in New Facility Startup.

New facilities by nature can be reactive. Reactive behavior when it comes to reliability and maintenance is expensive. Our goal should be to be proactive in identifying risk and mitigating or eliminating it before we have to react. When you bring a new plant online there are many things that can drive the culture to be reactive. I have listed a few below:

•          Poor start up planning and procedures
•          The presence of excessive amounts of infant mortality type failure modes
•          Equipment delivery delays
•          Stocking of incorrect spare parts
•          EPC contractor ineffectiveness
•          EPC contract language that does not insure correct function of the assets
•          No existing culture in the new facility while there is an influx of new employees from different cultures including other highly reactive companies.

With all of these reasons as well as others, it is no wonder that green field sites find themselves working to overcome a reactive culture, low production rates, and high cost. In order to limit the creation of this situation I have listed five way to turn the tide in favor of a proactive culture.

1. Start early creating the business processes which will help to create the new culture. When you on board new associates being able to show them how work will be done and train them in the use of proactive tools is critical. This will allow them to change their existing paradigms where required and give you a head start on the culture that is required for maximum return on investment.
2. Build the business processes based off of the best facilities in the world not just the best facilities in your division or company. Reach out with your early hire team and benchmark with an eye on being the best in the world within the constraints of your facilities business case.
3. Create failure mode based maintenance strategies using the equipment vendors, EPC, associates as they are brought onboard, the operating context specific to your facility, and tools like RAM, RCM, and FMEA. If this step is done correctly then it will reduce spare parts stocking levels, equipment failures, and poor procedures which will increase early production and profitability.
4. Budget for new associates to visit sister plants if they exist. The goal here is to ensure that they can have open dialogue with others who live with the assets on a daily basis. They should be looking to get hands on training, learn common problems, identify changes that have been made since start-up of the assets as well as other tidbits that will facilitate their site producing record tonnage the first year.
5. Fully populate your EAM or CMMS from the start with all of the assets, spare parts, drawings, and failure codes as provided by the vendors per your contractual request.

I hope these five items offer some help on new plant or new asset start up and if you would like to learn more about the elements of a good start up then reach out to me via email and I will provide you with a look at our R5 launch methodology for new facilities.

Material Management Single Point Lesson

The Materials Management (MM) single point lesson allows for the presenter to make a few key points.

First, with the statistics that are given, you can show that storerooms are driven by many different forces to expand. The Fact that both vendors and OEMs trying to sell parts and maintenance crafts personnel trying to ensure they have everything they could ever possibly use drive this expansion. We have to understand two things about this ever-expanding storeroom. First, the parts are not free; it costs money to buy and keep them on the shelf. Second, if you buy it and put it on the shelf, you now have to maintain it to prevent the introduction of defects that cost you production down the road. In the world of truly reliable plants, bad parts are just as bad as not having the part.

Critical spares, which are shown in the attic of the house, should be tagged as such and maintained better than the Christmas lights stored in your attic. If you only look at them when you need them, they will not satisfy your reliability goals.

In order to be a truly reliable plant, you will have to take out the trash occasionally. If your storeroom looks like something from Sanford and Sons, you cannot expect maximum performance. As hard as it is for maintenance people, you need to purge those  rusty 21-year old bearings that you are keeping “just in case”. That is the price of reliable equipment.

If you have the benefit of having locally available vendors who will stock or otherwise ensure that the parts can be available in the lead times required, then you can let them deal with the taxes, degradation, damage, security, etc. This is an area that strikes fear in many maintenance guys’ hearts, but is a great way to remove waste, induced failures, and cost from your materials business processes. 

I hope you can use this SPL to help your organization understand one more of the key elements in this five part series on the basics of reliability.