Up Time Magazine- February/March 2008

assets or facility do not meet user needs, they have failed functionally. Assets or facilities must be maintained to full functionality until shutting down permanently. Do any of these sound familiar? Could a breakdown in any of your processes, leadership, or managers’ application of common sense create a failure in your maintenance program? One of the best solutions is to educate your leaders in the value of maintenance and reliability. Vibration Analysis & Balancing Figure 5 - One of the Barracks Facilities at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. (courtesy of US Army) emergency repair sequences occurring during that time. For example, performing three emergency repair sequences in 24 hours gives you a MTBF of eight. Not enough money to hire an expert – I once visited a facility where the roof had failed numerous times over several years. During this time, the organization repaired or replaced the ceiling, flooring and walls repeatedly. The maintenance manager explained that the roof was not repaired properly because the maintenance person was not formally trained in roofing, but was the best on staff, and the manager could not afford to hire a roofing company. This statement seemed to ask more questions than it answered, since the cost of repeated ceiling repair and room damage must have far exceeded the cost of hiring a professional to fix the roof right in the first place. Not enough maintenance staff – You never will have enough maintenance staff if you do not reduce your emergency repair requirements for failing assets. You will also never control the failures if you don’t develop and manage a true PM program. Skimping on maintenance is OK because this building/equipment is scheduled for retirement – Are the demands or expectations on a piece of equipment, or a facility, being reduced? If not, they must be maintained to full capability and functionality. One of the main requirements of Reliability Centered Maintenance is for the functional capability of an asset to meet the needs of the user. If the What did the US Army do to correct the Garrison Facility Issue? The US Army Medical Command acted swiftly, while awaiting reports from outside agencies. They took immediate corrective action. Here’s a short list. Immediate Actions • Conducted an immediate Facility Condition Assessment of all Garrison facilities at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center Complex. This was contracted to the US Army Corps of Engineers. • Established a clear line of command and control, and responsibility regarding maintenance of the non-medical treatment facilities. • Assigned an experienced facilities engineer to oversee Garrison maintenance requirements. • Established a rapid response team to ensure maintenance issues in housing areas were resolved quickly, no matter what the time of day. Intermediate Actions • Examined maintenance and construction funding, re-prioritizing where necessary, to ensure wounded, ill and injured soldiers, and their families, would be accommodated according to their needs. h Watc O IDE e V n Onli VIBXPERT® VIBSCANNER® The right tool for every user, job and budget 305-591-8935 • www.ludeca.com www.uptimemagazine.com 13 http://www.ludeca.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Up Time Magazine- February/March 2008

Up Time Magazine- February/March 2008 Contents Upfront Upclose: Lessons Learned from the Walter Reed Story Information Technology: Parenting and Asset Performance Infrared: It's Alive! Lubrication: A Sense of Change Maintenance Management: PdM, Standardized Motor Testing: Being Well Connected Precision Maintenance: How to be Marketable Reliability: The Voyage of Wells Dairy Ultrasound: Two is Better Than One Vibration: Diagnosing a Cracked Shaft Upgrade: A Different Kind of Journey

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