What are the Uptime Awards?

Uptime® Magazine is a bi-monthly magazine devoted to asset management, reliability, predictive maintenance and machine condition monitoring. Part of our mission is to promote and acknowledge best practices.

We have created the Uptime Magazine Best Maintenance Reliability Awards to provide positive exposure and acknowledgment for maintenance reliability professionals from around the world.

The Uptime Awards were established in 2006 to:

• Acknowledge organizations and individuals who have achieved high levels of performance in maintenance reliability
• Provide a venue for Uptime Award winners to share information about their journey to high performance reliability
• Encourage other organizations and people to adopt the practices of these high performance programs
• Share a powerful self-assessment based on Uptime Elements — A Reliability System for Asset Performance Management

What are the benefits of participating in the Uptime Awards evaluation process?

Find out the benefits reported by previous Uptime Award participants here

Using Reliability Centered Maintenance and Condition Monitoring to drive Reliability Improvement

A 40 minute video from the International Maintenance Conference (IMC-211) delivered by Keith Berriman, P.Eng., CMRP, Director of Engineering and Reliability, Agrium Inc.

Timely identification of equipment failure allows for planned and scheduled repairs.  This in turn minimizes the impact of actual failure events on production and maintenance costs.  Agrium, like many asset intensive companies, have been using Preventive/Predictive Maintenance techniques to detect impending signs of failure in their equipment.  This has resulted in cost and availability improvements at many sites.  In addition they have worked to leverage RCM techniques to improve their PM/PdM program. However, strengthening market conditions are providing strong impetus for further improvement in availability and production.  To this end Agrium has launched a Reliability Improvement Program centered around Asset Health Monitoring based on RCM methodology.

See how Agrium has combined an asset health management solution with their SAP EAM to integrate operator rounds, vibration and other technologies to drive improvements in plant availability and production.   With this approach redundant PM work has been reduced and the frequency of plant trips has been improved.  In addition the program has driven the standardization of various plant software solutions and equipment hierarchies.  The goal of the program is to be doing the right work on the right equipment at the right time.

Note: A high definition DVD of IMC Keynotes and Presentations is available at the MRO-Zone.com e-Store

Which Predictive Maintenance Technology Is The Best?

Which Predictive Maintenance Technology Is The Best?
by Terrence O'Hanlon, Publisher and CEO Reliabilityweb.com and Uptime Magazine

I participate in many MaintenanceForum.com and LinkedIn discussion groups and I learn a lot from them.  Recently I was involved in a discussion that I hope was much more theoretical than practical.

The question posted was something like “If you could only choose one predictive maintenance (PdM) technology (I assume from the big 5 PdM technologies Vibration Analysis, Infrared Thermal Imaging, Airborne Ultrasound, Electric Motor Testing and Oil Analysis) which one is the best?”

Click here for Vibration Analysis articles and video tutorials

Click here for Infrared Thermal Imaging articles and video tutorials

Click here for Airborne Ultrasound articles and video tutorials

Click here for Electric Motor Testing articles and video tutorials

Click here for Oil Analysis articles and video tutorials

If you are involved with Predictive Maintenance, perhaps a better question is “Which PdM technology should we begin with?”

There is NO one predictive maintenance technology that does everything (even if the sales rep tell you differently!).

All 5 of the primary predictive maintenance technologies work together well – much like a doctor would use a stethoscope, a thermometer, collect blood and urine samples for analysis and possibly conduct more specific tests like a Doppler or EKG to make a diagnosis based on as much information as possible.

It would be nerve wracking to hear your Doctor ask – which diagnostic instrument is best – a stethoscope or a thermometer? 

Imagine the lack of confidence you would have if your Doctor said “Well Tom, your temperature is running pretty high so I think we should remove your gall bladder.”

Yikes – you probably agree with me that your life and health are worth finding a doctor who uses all available technologies to assess your condition.

It is fine to begin with one predictive maintenance technology but it not fine to end with only one.  Prove the worth of having the ability to detect potential failures further in advance, then use that benefit to justify adding more technologies to improve your failure detection capabilities.

A Cradle to Grave Approach - Motor Management at Its Best

A Cradle to Grave Approach - Motor Management at Its Best


Ask a motor manufacturer how long one of its motors is expected to live, and the response will be something like, “20-plus years in the right environment.” Ask the same question in a facility that uses such a motor and the answer is more likely to be, “If we get five years out of it, we’ll be happy!” Why does this discrepancy exist? Why do motors die of an infant mortality instead of living to the ripe old age for which they are designed and built? The answer has to do with the failure to optimize motor management and maintenance.


Read more at http://reliabilityweb.com/index.php/articles/a_cradle_to_grave_approach_-_motor_management_at_its_best/