FEATURE Machine Safety
How and when to troubleshoot By Steve Skinner, on behalf of Webtec Products U
nexpected breakdowns on modern machinery are now much less common than they were 30 or 40 years ago. This
has been brought about by an emphasis on reliability engineering, together with the ready availability of low-cost sensors, monitoring devices and digital communications. However, none of these devices and processes can guarantee that breakdowns will be eliminated altogether, so maintenance personnel still need to be equipped with both the skills and diagnostic equipment necessary to avoid costly and potentially dangerous machine breakdowns and malfunctions. Of course, if breakdowns now occur less
frequently, then maintenance personnel may have had less practice and experience at handling them compared to their counterparts all those years ago, so their approach to problem solving is now perhaps more important than ever. When machinery does break down or malfunction there is always a strong expectation to be seen to be “getting out there and doing something”, since it’s likely that money is being lost through loss of production, crops spoiling in the fi eld or penalty clauses mounting up due to a delayed job. The temptation is always present just to jump in and do something in the hope that it may cure the problem. If the machine has broken down in a similar way before, it’s easy to assume it’s the same problem. If changing the pump cured the problem last time, maybe it will solve the problem again. Or, maybe not! Troubleshooting on any machine should
Troubleshooting example
be a logical, step-by-step process, starting with fi nding out the fault’s nature. A maintenance technician should gather as much information as possible about the problem from its operatives. Assuming the fault is not immediately obvious, such as a burst hose for example, then the next step is to fully understand the operation of the machine and its associated controls, if not done before. Unless it’s known how something works, it’s diffi cult to imagine what could go wrong with it. Apart from talking to the machine operator, this may entail reading machine manuals, studying circuit diagrams, etc., – vital steps in the process.
Once the machine operation is understood, it should then be possible to draw up a list of possible causes of the problem. Some will be more likely than others, and some easier to check than others, so the list can now be prioritised based on examining the most likely or easiest causes fi rst. An initial examination can then be carried out looking for any
obvious signs of malfunction, such as excessive noise or heat, incorrectly- adjusted or leaking components, loose wires or connectors, and so on. This step doesn’t involve any additional equipment or instrumentation other than that already installed and provided; many machine problems can often be diagnosed at this stage.
Troubleshooting example
Where the cause of the fault is more challenging, however, then additional instrumentation may be required to locate it. Fortunately, portable diagnostic equipment is now readily available, ranging from simple plug-in pressure gauges to thermal imaging cameras that can detect sources of excess heat generation. Equipment also exists to diagnose the root cause of component failures, such as fl uid-condition monitoring instruments. So, whereas it may no longer be realistic to expect maintenance technicians to be intimately familiar with the operation of all the machines they have responsibility for, if they have been trained in a logical troubleshooting process, then whatever problem arises, they should be able to locate and rectify the fault in a consistent and effi cient manner and as speedily as possible. This step-by-step approach is explained in Webtec’s troubleshooting training video:
https://en.webtec.com/ education/training-videos/
CONTACT:
Webtec
www.webtec.com
22 October 2021 | Automation
automationmagazine.co.uk
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