MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)

UNIT I PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICES OF MAINTENANCE PLANNING

10

Basic principles of maintenance planning Objectives and principles of planned

maintenance activity Importance and benefits of sound maintenance systems
Reliability and machine availability MTBF, MTTR and MWT Factors of
availability Maintenance organization Maintenance economics.
Maintenance Engineering is the discipline and profession of applying engineering
concepts to the optimization of equipment, procedures, and departmental budgets to
achieve better maintainability, reliability, and availability of equipment.
Maintenance, and hence maintenance engineering, is increasing in importance due to
rising amounts of equipment, systems, machineries and infrastructure.
Since the Industrial Revolution, devices, equipment, machinery and structures have
grown increasingly complex, requiring a host of personnel, vocations and related systems
needed to maintain them.
Prior to 2006, the United States spent approximately US$300 billion annually on plant
maintenance and operations alone.
A person practicing Maintenance Engineering is known as a Maintenance Engineer.

OBJECTIVES AND PRINCIPLES :

Analysis of repetitive equipment failures.
Estimation of maintenance costs and evaluation of alternatives.
Forecasting of spare parts.
Assessing the needs for equipment replacements and establish replacement
programs when due application of scheduling and project management
principles to replacement programs.
Assessing required maintenance tools and skills required for efficient
maintenance of equipment.
Assessing required skills required for maintenance personnel.
Reviewing personnel transfers to and from maintenance organizations
assessing and reporting safety hazards associated with maintenance of
equipment.

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2. The Planning Department concentrates on future work-work that has not been started--in order to provide the
Maintenance Department at least one week of work backlog
that is planned, approved, and ready to execute. This
backlog allows crews to work primarily on planned work.

3. The Planning Department maintains a simple, secure

file system based on equipment tag numbers. The file
system enables planners to utilize equipment data and
information learned on previous work to prepare and
improve work plans, especially on repetitive maintenance
tasks. The majority of maintenance tasks are repetitive
over a sufficient period of time. File cost information
assists making repair or replace decisions.

Crew supervisors handle the current day's work and

problems. Any problems that arise after commencement of
any job are resolved by the craft technicians or supervisors.
After every job completion, feedback is given by the lead
technician or supervisor to the Planning Department. The
feedback consists of any problems, plan changes, or other
helpful information so that future work plans and schedules
might be improved. The planners ensure that feedback
information gets properly filed to aid future work.

Supervisors and plant engineers are trained to access

these files to gather information they need with minimal
planner assistance.

MAINTENANCE
1. The planners are organized into a separate department
from the craft maintenance crews to facilitate specializing in
planning techniques as well as focusing on future work.

PLANNING

4. Planners use personal experience and file information

to develop work plans to avoid anticipated work delays
and quality or safety problems.
As a minimum, planners are experienced, top level technicians
that are trained in planning techniques.

PRINCIPLES

6. Wrench time is the primary measure of workforce

efficiency and of planning and scheduling effectiveness.
Wrench time is the proportion of available-to-work time
during which craft persons are not being kept from productively working on a job site by delays such as waiting for
assignment, clearance, parts, tools, instructions, travel,
coordination with other crafts, or equipment information.
Work that is planned before assignment reduces unnecessary
delays during jobs and work that is scheduled reduces delays
between jobs.

5. The Planning Department recognizes the skill of the

crafts. In general, the planner's responsibility is "what" before
"how." The planner determines the scope of the work request
including clarification of the originators intent where necessary.
The planner then plans the general strategy of the work (such
as repair or replace) and includes a preliminary procedure if
there is not one already in the file. The craft technicians use
their expertise to make the specified repair or replacement.
The planners and technicians work together over repeated jobs
to develop better procedures and checklists.

Maintenance Planning and Scheduling Handbook

Doc Palmer [email protected] United States of America (904) 228-5700

MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
Reliability may be defined in several ways:
The idea that an item is fit for a purpose with respect to time.
In the most discrete and practical sense: "Items that do not fail in use are reliable"
and "Items that do fail in use are not reliable".
The capacity of a designed, produced or maintained item to perform as required
over time.
The capacity of a population of designed, produced or maintained items to
perform as required over time.
The resistance to failure of an item over time.
The probability of an item to perform a required function under stated conditions
for a specified period of time.
In line with the creation of safety cases for safety, the goal is to provide a robust set of
qualitative and quantitative evidence that an item or system will not contain unacceptable
risk.
The basic sorts of steps to take are to:
First thoroughly identify as many as possible reliability hazards (e.g. relevant
System Failure Scenarios item Failure modes, the basic Failure mechanisms and
root causes) by specific analysis or tests.
Assess the Risk associated with them by analysis and testing.
Propose mitigations by which the risks may be lowered and controlled to an
acceptable level.
Select the best mitigations and get agreement on final (accepted) Risk Levels,
possible based on cost-benefit analysis.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
AVAILABILITY
A Reliability Program Plan may also be used to evaluate and improve
Availability of a system by the strategy on focusing on increasing testability &
maintainability and not on reliability.
Improving maintainability is generally easier than reliability. Maintainability
estimates (Repair rates) are also generally more accurate.
However, because the uncertainties in the reliability estimates are in most
cases very large, it is likely to dominate the availability (prediction
uncertainty) problem; even in the case maintainability levels are very high.
When reliability is not under control more complicated issues may arise, like
manpower (maintainers / customer service capability) shortage, spare part
availability, logistic delays, lack of repair facilities, extensive retro-fit and
complex configuration management costs and others.
The problem of unreliability may be increased also due to the "Domino
effect" of maintenance induced failures after repairs.
Only focusing on maintainability is therefore not enough. If failures are
prevented, none of the others are of any importance and therefore reliability is
generally regarded as the most important part of availability

A Fault Tree Diagram

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)

One of the most important design techniques is redundancy.

RELIABILITY THEORY
Reliability is defined as the probability that a device will perform its intended function
during a specified period of time under stated conditions. Mathematically, this may be
expressed as,

,
where

is the failure probability density function and is the length of the

period of time (which is assumed to start from time zero).

ACCELERATED TESTING:
The purpose of accelerated life testing is to induce field failure in the laboratory at a
much faster rate by providing a harsher, but nonetheless representative, environment.
In such a test, the product is expected to fail in the lab just as it would have failed in the
fieldbut in much less time.
The main objective of an accelerated test is either of the following:
To discover failure modes.
To predict the normal field life from the high stress lab life.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
An Accelerated testing program can be broken down into the following steps:
Software reliability is a special aspect of reliability engineering. System reliability, by
definition, includes all parts of the system, including hardware, software, supporting
infrastructure (including critical external interfaces), operators and procedures.
Traditionally, reliability engineering focuses on critical hardware parts of the system.
Since the widespread use of digital integrated circuit technology, software has become an
increasingly critical part of most electronics and, hence, nearly all present day systems.
Despite this difference in the source of failure between software and hardware, several
software reliability models based on statistics have been proposed to quantify what we
experience with software: the longer software is run, the higher the probability that it will
eventually be used in an untested manner and exhibit a latent defect that results in a
failure (Shooman 1987), (Musa 2005), (Denney 2005).
As with hardware, software reliability depends on good requirements, design and
implementation. Software reliability engineering relies heavily on a disciplined software
engineering process to anticipate and design against unintended consequences. There is
more overlap between software quality engineering and software reliability engineering
than between hardware quality and reliability. A good software development plan is a key
aspect of the software reliability program. The software development plan describes the
design and coding standards, peer reviews, unit tests, configuration management,
software metrics and software models to be used during software development.
Define objective and scope of the test
Collect required information about the product
Identify the stress(es)
Determine level of stress(es)
Conduct the accelerated test and analyze the collected data.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
MEAN TIME BETWEEN FAILURES
Mean time between failures (MTBF) is the predicted elapsed time between inherent
failures of a system during operation.[1] MTBF can be calculated as the arithmetic mean
(average) time between failures of a system.
FORMAL DEFINITION OF MTBF
By referring to the figure above, the MTBF is the sum of the operational periods divided
by the number of observed failures.
If the "Down time" (with space) refers to the start of "downtime" (without space) and "up
time" (with space) refers to the start of "uptime" (without spMean time betMean time
between failuresween failuresace), the formula will be:

The MTBF is often denoted by the Greek letter , or

The MTBF can be defined in terms of the expected value of the density function (t)

where is the density function of time until failure satisfying the standard requirement
of density functions

The Overview
For each observation, downtime is the instantaneous time it went down, which is after
(i.e. greater than) the moment it went up, uptime. The difference
(downtime minus uptime) is the amount of time it was operating between these two
events.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
MTBF value prediction is an important element in the development of products.
Reliability engineers / design engineers, often utilize Reliability Software to calculate
products' MTBF according to various methods/standards (MIL-HDBK-217F, Telcordia
SR332, Siemens Norm, FIDES,UTE 80-810 (RDF2000), etc.).
However, these "prediction" methods are not intended to reflect fielded MTBF as is
commonly believed. The intent of these tools is to focus design efforts on the weak links
in the design

MTTR
MTTR is an abbreviation that has several different expansions, with greatly differing
meanings.
It is wise to spell out exactly what is meant by the use of this abbreviation, rather than
assuming the reader will know which is being assumed.
The M can stand for any of minimum, mean or maximum, and the R can stand for any of
recovery, repair, respond, or restore.
The most common, mean, is also subject to interpretation, as there are many different
ways in which a mean can be calculated.
Mean time to repair
Mean time to recovery/Mean time to restore
Mean time to respond
Mean time to replace
In an engineering context with no explicit definition, the engineering figure of merit,
mean time to repair would be the most probable intent by virtue of seniority of usage.
It is also similar in meaning to the others above (more in the case of recovery, less in the
case of respond, the latter being more properly styled mean "response time").

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Maintenance Organization

Section 1.9. Sections 1.10 and 1.11 present education and training, and
management and labor relations, respectively. A summary of the chapter is
provided in Section 1.12.

1.2 Maintenance Organization Objectives and Responsibility

A maintenance organization and its position in the plant/whole organization is
heavily impacted by the following elements or factors:

Type of business, e.g., whether it is high tech, labor intensive, production

or service;
Objectives: may include profit maximization, increasing market share and
other social objectives;
Size and structure of the organization;
Culture of the organization; and
Range of responsibility assigned to maintenance.
PLANNING
Setting
performance
objectives and
developing
decisions on how to
achieve them

CONTROLLING
Measuring
performance of the
maintained equipment
and taking preventive
and corrective actions
to restore the
designed (desired)
specifications

Leaders
Influence

ORGANIZING
Creating structure:
setting tasks
(dividing up the
work), arranging
resources (forming
maintenance crews),
and coordinating
activites to perform
maintenance tasks

IMPLEMENTING
Executing the plans to
meet the set
performance
objectives

Figure 1.1. Maintenance organizing as a function of the management process

Organizations seek one or several of the following objectives: profit

maximization, specific quality level of service or products, minimizing costs, safe
and clean environment, or human resource development. It is clear that all of these

A.E. Haroun and S.O. Duffuaa

objectives are heavily impacted by maintenance and therefore the objectives of

maintenance must be aligned with the objectives of the organization.
The principal responsibility of maintenance is to provide a service to enable an
organization to achieve its objectives. The specific responsibilities vary from one
organization to another; however they generally include the following according to
Duffuaa et al. (1998):
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Keeping assets and equipment in good condition, well configured and safe
to perform their intended functions;
Perform all maintenance activities including preventive, predictive;
corrective, overhauls, design modification and emergency maintenance in
an efficient and effective manner;
Conserve and control the use of spare parts and material;
Commission new plants and plant expansions; and
Operate utilities and conserve energy.

The above responsibilities and objectives impact the organization structure for
maintenance as will be shown in the coming sections.

1.3 Determinants of a Maintenance Organization

The maintenance organizations structure is determined after planning the
maintenance capacity. The maintenance capacity is heavily influenced by the level
of centralization or decentralization adopted. In this section the main issues that
must be addressed when forming the maintenance organizations structure are
presented. The issues are: capacity planning, centralization vs decentralization and
in-house vs outsourcing.
1.3.1 Maintenance Capacity Planning
Maintenance capacity planning determines the required resources for maintenance
including the required crafts, administration, equipment, tools and space to execute
the maintenance load efficiently and meet the objectives of the maintenance
department. Critical aspects of maintenance capacity are the numbers and skills of
craftsmen required to execute the maintenance load. It is difficult to determine the
exact number of various types of craftsmen, since the maintenance load is
uncertain. Therefore accurate forecasts for the future maintenance work demand
are essential for determining the maintenance capacity. In order to have better
utilization of manpower, organizations tend to reduce the number of available
craftsmen below their expected need. This is likely to result in a backlog of
uncompleted maintenance work. This backlog can also be cleared when the
maintenance load is less than the capacity. Making long run estimations is one of
the areas in maintenance capacity planning that is both critical and not well
developed in practice. Techniques for maintenance forecasting and capacity
planning are presented in a separate chapter in this handbook.

Maintenance Organization

1.3.2 Centralization vs Decentralization

The decision to organize maintenance in a centralized, decentralized or a hybrid
form depends to a greater extent on the organization is philosophy, maintenance
load, size of the plant and skills of craftsmen. The advantages of centralization are:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Provides more flexibility and improves utilization of resources such

highly skilled crafts and special equipment and therefore results in more
efficiency;
Allows more efficient line supervision;
Allows more effective on the job training; and
Permits the purchasing of modern equipment.

However it has the following disadvantages:

1.
2.
3.
4.

Less utilization of crafts since more time is required for getting to and
from jobs;
Supervision of crafts becomes more difficult and as such less maintenance
control is achieved;
Less specialization on complex hardware is achieved since different
persons work on the same hardware; and
More costs of transportation are incurred due to remoteness of some of the
maintenance work.

In a decentralized maintenance organization, departments are assigned to

specific areas or units. This tends to reduce the flexibility of the maintenance
system as a whole. The range of skills available becomes reduced and manpower
utilization is usually less efficient than in a centralized maintenance. In some cases
a compromise solution that combines centralization and decentralization is better.
This type of hybrid is called a cascade system. The cascade system organizes
maintenance in areas and what ever exceeds the capacity of each area is challenged
to a centralized unit. In this fashion the advantages of both systems may be reaped.
For more on the advantages and disadvantages of centralization and decentralization see Duffuaa et al. (1998) and Niebel (1994).
1.3.3 In-house vs Outsourcing
At this level management considers the sources for building the maintenance
capacity. The main sources or options available are in-house by direct hiring,
outsourcing, or a combination of in-house and outsourcing. The criteria for
selecting sources for building and maintaining maintenance capacity include
strategic considerations, technological and economic factors. The following are
criteria that can be employed to select among sources for maintenance capacity:
1.
2.

Availability and dependability of the source on a long term basis;

Capability of the source to achieve the objectives set for maintenance by
the organization and its ability to carry out the maintenance tasks;

MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
UNIT- I
PRINCIPLES AND PRACTICES OF MAINTENANCE PLANNING
PART-A (2 Marks)
01. Define maintenance.
02. Define reliability.
03. State the benefits of reliability analysis in industries.
04. Define failure rate.
05. What is Mean Failure Rate?
06. Define Mean Time to Failure.
07. What is Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF)?
08. Define Mean Time to Repair (MTTR).
09. Define Maintenance Action Rate.
10. Define Failure Density.
PART-B (16 Marks)
1. What do you mean by maintenance job planning? Discuss various steps of
maintenance job planning. (16)
2. What is long term plan? Discuss few long term planning? (16)
3. What are the objectives of maintenance organization and what different types of
organizations are in use in Indian industries? (16)
4. What is equipment availability and what are the three basic approaches to define and
quantity availability. (16)
5. Explain MTBS, MTBF, MTTF, MTTR and failure rate? (16)
6. Explain briefly different types and classes of maintenance cost. (16)

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
UNIT II MAINTENANCE POLICIES PREVENTIVE MAINTENANCE
Maintenance categories Comparative merits of each category Preventive
maintenance, maintenance schedules and repair cycle Principles and methods of
lubrication TPM.

LUBRICATION
Lubrication is the process, or technique employed to reduce wear of one or both
surfaces in close proximity, and moving relative to each other, by interposing a substance
called lubricant between the surfaces to carry or to help carry the load (pressure
generated) between the opposing surfaces. The interposed lubricant film can be a solid,
(e.g. graphite, MoS2) a solid/liquid dispersion, a liquid, a liquid-liquid dispersion (a
grease) or, exceptionally, a gas.
In the most common case the applied load is carried by pressure generated within the
fluid due to the frictional viscous resistance to motion of the lubricating fluid between the
surfaces.
Lubrication can also describe the phenomenon such reduction of wear occurs without
human intervention (hydroplaning on a road).
The science of friction, lubrication and wear is called tribology.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
The regimes of lubrication
As the load increases on the contacting surfaces three distinct situations can be observed
with respect to the mode of lubrication, which are called regimes of lubrication:
Fluid film lubrication is the lubrication regime in which through viscous forces
the load is fully supported by the lubricant within the space or gap between the
parts in motion relative to one another (the lubricated conjunction) and solidsolid
contact is avoided.[2]
o

Hydrostatic lubrication is when an external pressure is applied to the

lubricant in the bearing, to maintain the fluid lubricant film where it would
otherwise be squeezed out.

Hydrodynamic lubrication is where the motion of the contacting surfaces,

and the exact design of the bearing is used to pump lubricant around the
bearing to maintain the lubricating film. This design of bearing may wear
when started, stopped or reversed, as the lubricant film breaks down.

Elastohydrodynamic lubrication: The opposing surfaces are separated, but there

occurs some interaction between the raised solid features called asperities, and
there is an elastic deformation on the contacting surface enlarging the loadbearing area whereby the viscous resistance of the lubricant becomes capable of
supporting the load.
Boundary lubrication (also called boundary film lubrication): The bodies come
into closer contact at their asperities; the heat developed by the local pressures
causes a condition which is called stick-slip and some asperities break off. At the
elevated temperature and pressure conditions chemically reactive constituents of
the lubricant react with the contact surface forming a highly resistant tenacious
layer, or film on the moving solid surfaces (boundary film) which is capable of
supporting the load and major wear or breakdown is avoided. Boundary
lubrication is also defined as that regime in which the load is carried by the
surface asperities rather than by the lubricant.[3]

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
Besides supporting the load the lubricant may have to perform other functions as well, for
instance it may cool the contact areas and remove wear products. While carrying out
these functions the lubricant is constantly replaced from the contact areas either by the
relative movement (hydrodynamics) or by externally induced forces.
Lubrication is required for correct operation of mechanical systems pistons, pumps, cams,
bearings, turbines, cutting tools etc. where without lubrication the pressure between the
surfaces in close proximity would generate enough heat for rapid surface damage which
in a coarsened condition may literally weld the surfaces together, causing seizure.
In some applications, such as piston engines, the film between the piston and the cylinder
wall also seals the combustion chamber, preventing combustion gases from escaping into
the crankcase
.TOTAL PRODUCTIVE MAINTENANCE
TPM is a maintenance process developed for improving productivity by making
processes more reliable and less wasteful.
TPM is an extension of TQM(Total Quality Management).
The objective of TPM is to maintain the plant or equipment in good condition without
interfering with the daily process.
To achieve this objective, preventive and predictive maintenance is required. By
following the philosophy of TPM we can minimize the unexpected failure of the
equipment.
To implement TPM the production unit and maintenance unit should work jointly.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
Original goal of total productive management:
Continuously improve all operational conditions, within a production system; by
stimulating the daily awareness of all employees (by Seiichi Nakajima, Japan, JIPM)
TPM focuses primarily on manufacturing (although its benefits are applicable to virtually
any "process") and is the first methodology Toyota used to improve its global position
(1950s). After TPM, the focus was stretched, and also suppliers and customers were
involved (Supply Chain), this next methodology was called lean manufacturing. This
sheet gives an overview of TPM in its original form.
An accurate and practical implementation of TPM, will increase productivity within the
total organization, where:
(1) A clear business culture is designed to continuously improve the efficiency of the
total production system.
(2) A standardized and systematic approach is used, where all losses are prevented and/or
known all departments, influencing productivity, will be involved to move from a
reactive to a predictive mindset.
(4) A transparent multidisciplinary organization in reaching zero losses.
(5) Steps are taken as a journey, not as a quick menu.
Finally TPM will provide practical and transparent ingredients to reach operational
excellence.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
IMPLEMENTATION
TPM has basically 3 goals - Zero Product Defects, Zero Equipment Unplanned Failures
and Zero Accidents.
It sets out to achieve these goals by Gap Analysis of previous historical records of
Product Defects, Equipment Failures and Accidents.
Then through a clear understanding of this Gap Analysis (Fishbone Cause-Effect
Analysis, Why-Why Cause-Effect Analysis, and P-M Analysis) plan a physical
investigation to discover new latent fuguai (slight deterioration) during the first step in
TPM Autonomous Maintenance called "Initial Cleaning".
TPM identifies the 7 losses (types of waste) (muda), namely set-up and initial adjustment
time, equipment breakdown time, idling and minor losses, speed (cycle time) losses,
start-up quality losses, and in process quality losses, and then works systematically to
eliminate them by making improvements (kaizen). TPM has 8 pillars of activity, each
being set to achieve a zero target.
These 8 pillars are the following: focussed improvement (Kobetsu Kaizen); autonomous
maintenance (Jishu Hozen); planned maintenance; training and education; early-phase
management; quality maintenance (Hinshitsu Hozen); office TPM; and safety, health, and
environment. Few organisation also add Pillars according to their Work Place like:
Tools Management; Information Technology & more.
The Base for the TPM Activity is 5S; Seiri (Sorting out the required or not required
items); Seition (Systematic Arrangement of the required items); Seiso (Cleaniness);
Seiketsu (Standardisation); Shitsuke (Self Discipline).
The Pillars & their details
a) Efficient Equipment Utilisation
b) Efficient Worker Utilisation
c) Efficient Material & Energy Utilisation
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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
REPAIRABLE
Repairable parts are parts that are deemed worthy of repair, usually by virtue of economic
consideration of their repair cost.
Rather than bear the cost of completely replacing a finished product, repairables typically
are designed to enable more affordable maintenance by being more modular.
This allows components to be more easily removed, repaired, and replaced, enabling
cheaper replacement.
Spare parts that are needed to support condemnation of repairable parts are known as
replenishment spares.
A rotable pool is a pool of repairable spare parts inventory set aside to allow for multiple
repairs to be accomplished simultaneously.
This can be used to minimize stockout conditions for repairable items.
REPAIR CYCLE
From the perspective of logistics, a model of the life cycle of parts in a supply chain can
be developed.
This model, called the repair cycle, consists of functioning parts in use by equipment
operators, and the entire sequence of suppliers or repair providers that replenish
functional part inventories, either by production or repair, when they have failed.
Ultimately, this sequence ends with the manufacturer.
This type of model allows demands on a supply system to ultimately be traced to their
operational reliability, allowing for analysis of the dynamics of the supply system, in
particular, spare parts.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
UNIT-II
MAINTENANCE POLICIES PREVENTIVE MAINTENANCE
PART-A (2 Marks)
01. What is meant by Breakdown maintenance approach?
02. Classify various planned maintenance approach.
03. Define Corrective maintenance approach.
04. What is meant by preventive maintenance approach?
05. List out the objectives of Corrective maintenance.
06. What is meant by Predictive Maintenance?
07. List out some condition based monitoring techniques and briefly discuss on them.
08. What is meant by Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM)?
09. What is Total Productive Maintenance (TPM) and discuss it's similarities with TQM?
10. What is, meant by Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM)?
11. What does Safety, Health and Environment pillar of TPM aims at?
PART-B (16 Marks)
1. What do you understand by maintenance categories? Explain common types and
explain the basis of their selection. .(16)
2. What are all the steps involved in preventive maintenance why preventive maintenance
is better than reactive maintenance. . (16)
3. Distinguish between fixed time maintenance and connect based maintenance. Give the
merits and demerits. . (16)
4. Briefly explain the procedure for TPM. .(16)
5. Explain the repair cycle of metallic materials. . (16)
6. What are the functions of lubrication and gives the tips on lubrication. (16)

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
UNIT III CONDITION MONITORING
Condition monitoring Cost comparison with and without CM On-load testing
and off-load testing Methods and instruments for CM Temperature sensitive
tapes Pistol thermometers Wear-debris analysis.

CONDITION MONITORING
Condition monitoring is the process of monitoring a parameter of condition in machinery,
such that a significant change is indicative of a developing failure.
It is a major component of predictive maintenance. The use of conditional monitoring
allows maintenance to be scheduled, or other actions to be taken to avoid the
consequences of failure, before the failure occurs.
Nevertheless, a deviation from a reference value (e.g. temperature or vibration behavior)
must occur to identify impeding damages
Predictive Maintenance does not predict failure.
Machines with defects are more at risk of failure than defect free machines. Once a
defect has been identified, the failure process has already commenced and CM systems
can only measure the deterioration of the condition.
Intervention in the early stages of deterioration is usually much more cost effective than
allowing the machinery to fail. Condition monitoring has a unique benefit in that the
actual load, and subsequent heat dissipation that represents normal service can be seen
and conditions that would shorten normal lifespan can be addressed before repeated
failures occur.
Serviceable machinery includes rotating equipment and stationary plant such as boilers
and heat exchangers.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
METHODS OF CM
1.

Screen monitoring records video or static images detailing the contents, or screen
capture, of the entire [video display] or the content of the screen activity within a
particular program or computer application. Monitoring tools may collect real
time video, accelerated or [time-lapse] video or screen shots, or may take video or
still image captures at regular intervals (e.g., once every 4 minutes). They may
collect images constantly or only collect information while the user is interacting
with the equipment (e.g., capturing screens when the mouse or keyboard is
active).

2.

Data monitoring tracks the content of and changes to files stored on the local
[hard drive] or in the user's "private" network share.

3.

Keystroke monitoring (e.g., number of keystrokes per minute) may track the
performance of keyboard-intensive work such as word processing or data entry.
Keystroke logging captures all keyboard input to enable the employer to monitor
anything typed into the monitored machine.

4.

Idle time monitoring keeps track of time when the employee is away from the
computer or the computer is not being actively used.

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MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
BENEFITS
o Screen monitoring records video or static images detailing the contents, or
screen capture, of the entire [video display] or the content of the screen
activity within a particular program or computer application.
o Monitoring tools may collect real time video, accelerated or [time-lapse]
video or screen shots, or may take video or still image captures at regular
intervals (e.g., once every 4 minutes).
o They may collect images constantly or only collect information while the user
is interacting with the equipment (e.g., capturing screens when the mouse or
keyboard is active).
o Data monitoring tracks the content of and changes to files stored on the local
[hard drive] or in the user's "private" network share.
o Keystroke monitoring (e.g., number of keystrokes per minute) may track the
performance of keyboard-intensive work such as word processing or data
entry. Keystroke logging captures all keyboard input to enable the employer to
monitor anything typed into the monitored machine.
o Idle time monitoring keeps track of time when the employee is away from the
computer or the computer is not being actively used.

NPRCET/MECHANICAL 21

SIMPLE INSTRUMENTS USED IN CONDITION

MONITORING
Prof. D.R.KIRAN
Head, department of production Engineering,
St.Peters Engineering College
NDE2002 predict. assure. improve.
National Seminar of ISNT
Chennai, 5. 7. 12. 2002
www.nde2002.org

ABSTRACT
Condition monitoring is a system of assessing the service condition or the change of
service condition of any component or a part of an equipment or a system. Considerable research
has been done in this direction leading to development of several electrical and electronic
monitoring instruments. These, when connected to strategic locations of the systems measure and
indicate certain parameters enabling us to monitor the condition and take vital decisions on a
continuous basis.
Nevertheless the high cost of these instruments prevent their use in all required locations.
On the other hand traditionally used simple mechanical gadgets are being used by the
maintenance personnel of todays industry all over the world. These have the advantages of being
portable, simple, easy to use and economical. More significantly they can be used to check any
location or component suspected to be functioning abnormally. This paper discusses some of
such instruments used and could be used for condition monitoring of industrial machines as well
as process equipment like pressure vessels and heat exchangers

1. What is Condition monitoring

Condition monitoring is that type of planned maintenance wherein the actual working
conditions of major components of an equipment are constantly monitored to give an indication
of which parts should be replaced and which need not in the near future. In other words the
preventive maintenance with condition monitoring is a system in which, in addition to the
programmed stoppages for maintenance work, an assessment is made on the condition of all
major parts of an equipment while in operation, even when a preventive maintenance schedule is
on. If by assessment, the condition of the part is satisfactory, the schedule of stopping the
machine or scrapping the part etc. is reviewed and deferred . Similarly if the condition monitoring
finds a certain part may fail in a short time, it is replaced even before its PM schedule and prevent
unexpected breakdowns.
2. On-load vs off load condition monitoring
On load monitoring means monitoring or adjusting the parameters while the machine or
equipment is running. Thus it is done for superficial, easily accessible & non interfering parts of
the equipment which can be carried out without interruption to the operation.

Off load monitoring is for interior or inaccessible parts, which need to be stopped temporarily to
check the condition. However there may be several situations like the two-shift working or the
plants temporary shut down for other reasons when this class can be conducted without
productions loss.

3. Subjective, aided subjective or objective condition monitoring

i)

Subjective condition monitoring :

Here the monitoring personnel use their perception of senses and judgement to note any
change of the condition. The four senses a man is bestowed with, like seeing (emanation of
smoke), hearing (bearing noise), smelling (burning of oil or rubber components due to excessive
heat), feeling (touching the motor to feel the excessive heating or touching the housing to feel a
vibrating shaft) are used. It is important that the person carrying out subjective condition
monitoring has an adequate qualifications and skills as the result depends on their judgement and
experience. In subjective condition monitoring it is also possible to use instructions, guidelines or
hints where to look for leakage, bearing play etc. Posters or figures illustrating different
conditions of components may also be helpful
ii)

Aided subjective or condition monitoring with simple gadgets:

Here the monitoring personnel use simple gadgets to add to their ability to perceive
conditions better. These gadgets are discussed more in detail in the following paragraphs.
iii)

Objective condition monitoring :

In objective condition monitoring different instruments and facilities are used for
obtaining data giving direct measure of the parametric condition of the components even while
the machine is working. In many cases these simple mechanical or complex electronic measuring
devices can be mounted on convenient locations for better monitoring and control.
A doctor feeling the pulse (subjective), his using a stethoscope to determine any
abnormal heart beat (aided subjective) or looking into the ECG monitor (objective) form the
examples of the above three categories.
4. Some of the gadgets and simple instruments used for condition monitoring
a)

Monitoring of visual condition of inaccessible parts/locations

Quite often the visual condition of the components located at inaccessible locations are to
be monitored, may be with respect to corrosion or fatigue cracking or even dust/ sediment
collection that is deleterious to the functioning of the component. Simple gadgets are being used
either on-line or off-line, to aid the perception of the condition. Depending upon the extent of
change as perceived, the equipment can be stopped for detailed check and/or rectification. Some
of the gadgets are illustrated below:
i) Inspection mirrors used to inspect crevices, dark spots , inside of narrow mouthed cylinders,

or the pipes of heat exchangers or boilers. These mirrors can be simple like that of a dentist or

a) with adjustable mirror angle controlled by a wire running along the holding rod or
b) illuminated with a light bulb near the mirror of special use in dark spots, inside

cylinders or inside heat exchanger pipes.

c) with telescopic rod, for adjusting the length of the gadget.
d) mirrors fitted inside a small tube rather than on a rod to prevent damage to the mirror

during insertion or other operation. These are also called as borescopes.

e) periscopic, for specialised applications or to assist the viewer et. Etc.

fig. 1 a) a collection of inspection mirrors. b) inspection of crevices and c) inspecting the inside of as cylinder

Of specific interest to the NDE practitioners is their versatility to inspect the inside of the
boiler pipes or heat exchanger pipes, which can tell a lot about the working condition of the
inside of the tubes about the rusting, cracking, sedimentation etc. enabling an early preventive
action.

Fig. 2. Use of borescopes to inspect heat exchanger pipes.

Fig. 3 borescopes and periscopes

ii) Endoscopes: These are like borescopes, but are flexible. They work on the principle of image

transfer by total internal reflection in a bundle of glass fibres. They are more popular with
gastroenterologists for diagnosing ulcers in stomachs. Also called optical fibroscopes, they are
flexible ands are more versatile in several applications illustrated below. Some times they are
permanently fixed for constant monitoring of critical components are inserted when needed
into pre-fixed tubular guides leading to the location to be monitored.

Fig. 4. The application of endoscopes in industrial equipment

Fig. 5. The principle of endoscope

Having illustrated the gadgets for visual perception as above, some of them used in other
monitoring functions may be cited as below, classified into the three categories.
b) Temperature monitoring

Subjective Touching the motor etc. and assessing if over heated.

Aided subjective Temperature sensitive stickers are the most common ands cost effective. A sticker having
four of five 20 mm diameter dots of special paints, each of which changes its colour at a
particular temperature. is stuck to the heat prone parts of the equipment. The operatives or
supervisor can identify its temperature range by looking at the stickers from a distance itself
during their periodic patrol rounds. Temperature sensitive chalks, thermal paints with which
larger part of the heat prone body is painted fall under this category Objective Pyrometers, thermometers, pistol thermometers etc. Depending of convenience and need,
these instruments can be of thermostat type or connected to some sort of warning system in case
of overheating.
c) Vibration monitoring
Subjective
By touching and feeling the vibrations in a rotating body or by listening to vibrating
sounds.
Aided subjective
Stethoscopes, use of screw driver ends by expert foremen etc.

Objective Shock pulse meters (SPM), vibration measuring instruments etc.

Vibration measurements made near the source of vibration might indicate the following:
imbalance
shaft misalignment
damaged bearings (worn or chipped balls or races)
damaged gears another transmission components
mechanical looseness
cavitation and stall etc.

d) Leak Monitoring

Subjective Listening to and identifying any hissing sound near hydraulic or pneumatic circuits.
Aided subjective A number of leak detecting techniques are available, including the soap and water methods.
Use of proprietary preparations can make this method more effective, capable of detecting leaks
as low as 1 m1/s.
Objective One powerful technique is ultrasonic detection. When a fluid is forced through a leak
under internal or external pressure, sound is generated in the frequency range 40-80 Khz. The
ultrasonic leak detector identifies this very high frequency which is easily separated from the
lower frequencies of ordinary machine noise.

Fig. 6. Ultrasonic leak detector to detect internal & external leaks

e) Corrosion Monitoring

Subjective Corrosion cannot be generally judged visually and is not as effective as those discussed
below.
Aided subjective Corrosion coupons, which are small pieces say 1 square inch, of the same material as the
base, are pasted at locations suspected to be highly corrosive, and analysed once in a month or as
required. The corrosion characteristics of the coupon are expected to be same as the base metal to
which they are pasted, and hence give an indirect measurement the corrosion of the body.

Fig. 7.a) A view of the corrosion coupon. b)The coupon mounted in tubes carrying chemicals

Objective Electrical and electronic devises can be developed to measure the corrosion characteristics based
on the following principles, the details of which are beyond the scope of this paper.

The basic principle in Corrosion Monitoring is the change in the resistance of special
electrical elements in corrosion environment.

The potential difference between the reference electrode and the system will indicate
the presence and the extent of corrosion.

The polarisation resistance of the special designed probe indicate the rate of
corrosion.

Hydrogen gas formation during corrosion can be detected with a thin walled blind
tube which can be analysed to determine the corrosion.

f) Belt tension monitoring:

subjective Slightly pressing down the V-belt

Aided subjective Pen type tension gage as illustrated below is a simple and handy one. Depending upon
belt looseness, the inner part of the gage telescopes into the upper part, leaving the rubber ring
stuck on to the lower part at the lowest point of insertion. On removing the gage, the position of
the rubber ring on the graduated scale of the lower part indicates the belt looseness, that can be
corrected if necessary.
Objective Strain gages or other electronic instruments are used to measure the stresses in metallic
parts or components.

Fig. 8. a) pen type tension gage and b) strain gage for bi-directional measurement

g) Shaft run-out monitoring:

When a lathe is being tested for accuracy, a mandrel is fixed in the spindle and rotated
and checked for the run-out.
Subjective If the run-out is high, it can be visually seen.
Aided subjective -

By use of dial gages fixed on to the bodies, the amount of run-out can be measured. But
this can be done by turning the spindle by hand or at low speeds.
Objective Optical sensors as illustrated below can be used to check the run-out even at high speeds.

Fig. 9 Run-out checking by optical sensor

h) Crack detection
This is mostly off-line monitoring and most tests under this category form NDE tests, the
primary function of ISNT specialists. Most serious failures are preceded by crack growth from a
point of stress concentration or from a material defect at the surface of the component. A number
of crack detection techniques have been developed to a great degree of advancement, like dye
penetration test (PT), magnetic particle test (MT). Electrical resistance or eddy current test (ET),
Ultrasonic Testing (UT) and Radiographic test (RT).
While the first two of the following can be classified as aided subjective, the latter can be
categorised as objective Since the purpose of this paragraph is to highlight crack detection as a
condition monitoring techniques, these NDE methods are only cited but not discussed further.
5. Conclusion

While only few types of monitoring namely, visual, temperature, vibration, leak,
corrosion, run-out, belt tension, and crack monitoring are discussed, a host of simple gadgets are
being developed according to their specific use for many other monitoring functions that are not
discussed here.

********

MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
LOAD TESTING
o Load testing is the process of putting demand on a system or device
and measuring its response.
o Load testing is performed to determine a systems behavior under both
normal and anticipated peak load conditions.
o It helps to identify the maximum operating capacity of an application
as well as any bottlenecks and determine which element is causing
degradation.
o When the load placed on the system is raised beyond normal usage
patterns, in order to test the system's response at unusually high or
peak loads, it is known as stress testing.
o The load is usually so great that error conditions are the expected
result, although no clear boundary exists when an activity ceases to be
a load test and becomes a stress test.
o There is little agreement on what the specific goals of load testing are.
o The term is often used synonymously with concurrency testing,
software performance testing, reliability testing, and volume testing.
o Load testing is a type of non-functional testing.

NPRCET/MECHANICAL 22

MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
WEAR DEBRIS ANALYSIS
Using a Scanning Electron Microscope of a carefully taken sample of debris
suspended in lubricating oil (taken from filters or magnetic chip detectors).
Instruments then reveal the elements contained, their proportions, size and
morphology.
Using this method, the site, the mechanical failure mechanism and the time to
eventual failure may be determined. This is called WDA - Wear Debris Analysis

NPRCET/MECHANICAL 23

MAINTENANCE ENGINEERING(ME1012)
UNIT-III
CONDITION MONOTORING
PART-A (2 Marks)
1. What is equipment health monitoring?
2. List down the factors for increasing the demand condition monitoring.
3. List down the key features of condition monitoring.
4. Write down the basic steps in condition monitoring.
5. What are three types of condition monitoring?
6. State the advantages and disadvantages of condition monitoring.
7. Mention the various costs involved in costing of condition monitoring mainly.
8. State the methods of measuring vibration.
9. Describe briefly pistol thermometer.
10. Name the types of pyrometers.
11. Mention title applications of bimetallic strip.
12. List down the features of RTD.
13. State the applications and limitations of thermisters.
PART-B (16 Marks)
1. What is condition monitoring and explain condition monitoring What type of condition
monitoring are normally used in industry. (16)
2. What is leakage monitoring? Explain some of the leakage mediums used for condition
monitoring. (16)
3. What is wear debris analysis what are the three wear debris analysis techniques
commonly used and compare their performance and uses? . (16)
4. Briefly explain the cost comparison with and without condition monitoring. (16)
5. What is thermal monitoring and what thermal monitoring are used in industries
explain principle and uses of thermograph .(16)
6. Briefly explain various methods and instruments for condition monitoring. (16)

NPRCET/MECHANICAL 24