Condition monitoring devices provide a window into equipment operating conditions

Rotating equipment can deliver optimal performance and long life reliability if installed, maintained and operated properly. Increasingly, condition monitoring devices, part of the family of options for predictive maintenance, are being used to keep tabs on the operating conditions of equipment to ensure peak performance. Tools exist today that allow monitoring of equipment, including in hard to reach and dangerous locations, allowing for a complete predictive programme that reduces downtime, failures and costs. Condition monitoring alerts users when a problem exists and needs their attention. This allows maintenance personnel to take action proactively in a planned and scheduled manner rather than reacting to unexpected component failures.

Deciding What to Monitor

When approached properly, condition monitoring tools can improve equipment production, uptime and profitability.

Monitoring candidates include rotating components like bearings, gears, motors, pumps, compressors, fans and other critical machine elements. When these elements become worn, contaminated, damaged or suffer from improper lubrication, the components or the entire machine may experience increased vibration and temperature, leading to potentially costly problems.

Applied to a broad number of applications, environments and industries, manufacturers, like The Timken Company, offer a variety of condition monitoring tools that aid in predictive maintenance and meet the needs, budgets and resources of a customer. Deciding How You Will Monitor When deciding to implement a condition monitoring device or system, it is critical that the chosen tools provide the expected return on investment. As such, plants should consider the number of points to be monitored, their budget, the critical value of the equipment in question, and the expertise of their maintenance personnel to ensure they procure the proper mix of condition monitoring tools to meet their performance expectations.

Careful review of the needs and expectations can lead customers down several paths. Popular choices in condition monitoring include comprehensive continuous monitoring systems, modular condition monitoring systems, and route-based condition monitoring using handheld devices. The key is knowing the pros and cons of each. Wireless Condition Monitoring Ideal for difficult-to-reach locations, dangerous environments and remote or satellite operations, wireless tools provide operators with quick, real-time assessments of the equipment being monitored.

The benefits of a wireless device are its ease of installation, ability to provide 24/7 monitoring of the equipment, and its ability to monitor areas that are too difficult to monitor manually. The upfront costs of a wireless system are more than a route-based handheld device but are less than that of a wired continuous monitor system. Available in a variety of options, the general operations of wireless tools are similar. Take for example Timken? StatusCheck