Lubricant procurement is not the largest expenditure in a typical maintenance budget. However, it is viewed as a real, tangible expense that is frequently targeted for cost reduction. When it comes to lubricants, it is unwise to pretend to save money by “buying cheap.”

Lubricants are the lifeblood of your machinery. Your machines’ life expectancy depends largely on the quality and state of these lubricants to bathe heavily loaded frictional surfaces. This also goes for investing in quality technologies and tools used in your lubrication program (such as routing software or automated lubricators) to promote efficiency. Optimum reliability and lubrication must go hand in hand.

Now that you are aware of the perils of poor-quality lubricants and lubrication, let’s take a look at the many opportunities to reduce lubricant spending without compromising reliability. Start by writing a simple lubricant specification for each machine.

Don’t rely solely on the recommendations of the equipment supplier or service manual. Instead, be bold and challenge generic or generalized statements relating to viscosity and lubricant formulation.

Once again, there is a need for caution. I’m not suggesting willy-nilly lubricant changes in an effort to enhance reliability by trial and error. There is always risk associated with changing lubricants. Smart practices, though, can quickly overcome these dangers. Risk should be respected but not feared.

The lubricant specification should be aligned with the optimum reference state for machine reliability. In constructing this specification, you should understand machine failure modes and overall machine criticality as a foundation to defining a machine’s precise lubricant needs.

There is a vast number of lubricant types available from both major and independent suppliers. Navigating the maze of options can be daunting but often very worth the effort. Find help if needed.

Reducing lubricant spending requires change and initiative. For many organizations, the low-hanging fruit is obvious. Below are five effective strategies for reducing your annual lubricant spending.

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A wide range of fluid degradation and contamination-related issues can affect turbine lube oil systems. One serious and growing concern is the presence of sludge and varnish. This condition can occur in even the most well-maintained machines. Surprisingly, it can also happen when oils are not particularly old or contaminated. And it can occur with even the most thermally robust synthetic lubricants and hydraulic fluids.

In turbine systems, there are few failure conditions that can disrupt operation as quickly and completely as a varnished and seized-up control valve operation. This can be the cause of a tripped turbine forced outage or other production losses. So too, sludge in many circulating lube oil systems can gum up flow controls, strainers and critical oil ways. In recent years, there has been a large number of reported cases associated with varnish and sludge formation in turbine-generator applications. Explanations for these problems have varied but typically include Group II mineral oil solubility issues, additive instability, bulk oil oxidation, adiabatic compressive heating and electrostatic discharge, among others. This paper will review precursor conditions that lead to sludge formation, some of the common lubricant degradation methods and the role of oil analysis in recognizing the potential risk well ahead of failure.

The post Review of Degradation Mechanisms Leading to Sludge and Varnish in Modem Turbine Oil Formulations appeared first on Tesibis.

The reasons that lubricants age and need to be replaced periodically are well known. It is true that many of the factors that influence lubricant consumption and oil change intervals are not within the realm of control of most users. However, there are far more controllable factors that many user organizations fail to capitalize on in reducing both costs and risks associated with relubrication.

According to one report, the true cost of an oil change can exceed 40 times the cost of the oil itself. In fact, there are many hidden costs and unknown risks that are encountered during relubrication that must be considered.

The post Strategies to Extend Drain Intervals and Reduce Lubricant Consumption appeared first on Tesibis.

High consumption of engine oil is almost always a symptom or consequence of another condition of even greater importance. This article will address this issue from the standpoint of oil loss through combustion pathways (versus leakage).

While the focus will be more on diesel engines used in industrial and commercial service, much of what will be discussed applies equally well to personal automobiles and natural gas engines.

By itself, oil consumption is a well-known source of harmful emissions to the atmosphere (see the sidebar on page 4). Unburned or partially burned oil is released through the exhaust path in the form of hydrocarbons and particulate contamination (soot).

Additionally, motor oil anti-wear additives are known to poison or at least impair the performance of catalytic converters. The more oil consumed through the combustion chamber, the greater this poisoning risk/effect. This escalates the environmental impact further.

The causes of high oil consumption are many and complex. Because this consumption is symptomatic of other conditions, there is a need to be aware of changes in the oil consumption rate. These changes should be viewed in the context of other data and factors, including oil analysis, visual exhaust, engine service life (from last rebuild), boost pressures, running temperature, load/RACK, blow-by and operating conditions. Oil analysis will be discussed in terms of the correlation and meaning of common trends and how they might be useful for troubleshooting purposes.

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