Preventative maintenance of equipment reduces the risk of on the job accidents. Here’s a clean-cut way to design an effective preventative maintenance program. 

What is Preventive Maintenance (PM)?

Preventative maintenance is routine maintenance performed on equipment to ensure its efficacy. This type of support is especially crucial for any business that uses heavy machinery like iron and steel. Preventative maintenance reduces the chances of breakdowns and saves engineers stress and money. 

A reliable preventative maintenance program saves companies from unwanted downtime. And, it allows companies to maintain productivity levels.  

Effective preventative maintenance programs use maintenance planning and scheduling before parts experience issues. (PM) also accounts for data from the past, such as previous breakdowns and maintenance reports. 

Noticing the potential for these small problems increases productivity. It also saves engineers cash and labor costs. 

1. Develop a Plan

Before putting a PM plan into effect, establish who performs the tasks. Choosing who conducts your PM plan is just as important as the plan itself. Maintenance managers are an excellent choice for PM workers. 

Maintenance technicians are good workers to place underneath maintenance managers. However, it’s important to manage employee workloads.

Sometimes workers are overworked and not interested in the preventative maintenance program. In that case, you’re spending precious labor hours for nothing.

First, figure out who performs the maintenance. Then, decide what support your company needs and the program’s schedule.

An example of a PM maintenance project goal is reducing maintenance costs by 15% in the second business quarter. 

2. Inventory Facility Equipment/Assets

The most time-consuming aspect of setting up a preventive maintenance program is setting an accurate inventory. Setting an inventory is also the most critical.  

Taking an inventory allows employees to create a routine out of their preventative checks. With an inventory, employees can cross each item off a list as they finish tasks. 

3. Create Preventive Maintenance Procedures

After creating an inventory, create the specific maintenance procedures for each inventory item. Create a frequency number to accompany the task to tell workers how often they should perform maintenance checks.   

4. Create Preventive Maintenance Schedules

Creating a preventative maintenance schedule involves designating high-priority items and low-priority items. These designations communicate that certain parts are more susceptible to breakdowns than others. It also identifies the impact of a piece breaking down.

5. Training Your Maintenance Team

A preventative maintenance program is useless without proper training. Your plan could be the most brilliant, but if your employees don’t understand it, it’s futile. It’s not you who runs the preventative maintenance program; it’s your maintenance staff. 

6. Analyze – Adjust – Improve

A company’s ability to adapt defines its success. Equipment changes and maintenance methods vary with the machine. Staying on top of the best procedures for your company’s equipment keeps your preventative maintenance program consistent. 

A Preventative Maintenance Program Makes a Huge Difference

In an industry where performance is everything, it’s essential to have protection measures in place. Constructing a preventative maintenance program saves your company time and increases its production output. 

Click here to discover how else you can respond to your industrial needs!

The modern era has ushered in a wave of new technology. Much of that technology is targeted squarely at one thing: improving mass production capabilities. 

Ever since the Industrial Revolution kicked off back in the 18th century, the engineering design process has been completely overhauled. Nowadays, you must use technology to achieve the best designs possible.

Technology doesn’t make up for lack of skill. Here are some essential tips to improve your capacity as an engineer to design high-quality products.

Identify Success Criteria

Before you fire up your CAD program or start building solutions to any of your engineering problems, there’s one crucial step to know. That step is identifying success criteria. These success criteria should outline what a completed project will look like.

The success criteria should be given to you by the final recipients of the completed project.  

You need to have a very clear picture of what function you’re trying to support and what result you’re trying to create before you begin designing.

Outline Constraints

With any engineering project, you will have a set of parameters that you will have to adhere to.

These will be your constraints. Such a limitation could be a limit on the power that the unit you design draws or specific dimensions that it must be able to fit into.

What happens when you don’t know your constraints? You might design a perfectly-functioning unit that can’t be used in the real world. So, when you identify your success criteria, take the extra effort to understand the key constraints you’ll use to guide your design.

Consider Manufacturing Capabilities

During the engineering design process, one has to be aware of the limitations that exist in the manufacturing world. Each piece of industrial equipment that will be used to manufacture your engineering creations has specific restrictions on its outputs.

For instance, a specific piece of equipment may only have a tolerance to the nearest inch. Thus, a design that has to be built precisely to the nearest half-inch could not be appropriately produced using that equipment.

Before you start designing, make sure that you consider the manufacturing limitations. Check the restrictions on the industrial equipment that will be used to produce your design. As a bonus, talk to those who operate the equipment. Operators often can provide a great picture of what designs can and cannot be produced on the equipment they operate.

The Engineering Design Process, Made Simple

There you have it. With these critical tips under your belt, you should have a clearer understanding of how the engineering design process works in the corporate world.

Always remember to identify success criteria and outline constraining parameters before you design the project. Design the project within the limits of the manufacturing equipment you have to work with, and you’ll be good to go.

For more engineering advice, be sure to check out the rest of the articles available to read on our website!

A small business inventory management system can help productivity. 

If you’re trying to determine solutions to benefit your inventory management and to make your company as efficient as possible, keep reading. In this guide, we will let you in on all the fantastic things the right inventory management system can do for you. 

Elevate Efficiency and Accuracy 

Inventory inaccuracies can have severe implications for your business. These inaccuracies can result in over ordering a product or thinking you have many products that you actually don’t have at all. 

Having an accurate inventory system can assist in enhancing your order accuracy. If you currently use an employee to track your inventory numbers, you may want to omit this job role. Not only does this allow room for human error, but you’re also adding unnecessary dollars to your payroll.

Make sure that you’re using your employees for more necessary efforts with an inventory management system instead. This system will prove to be a high return on investment. You will find that it will save your time and money, as well as avoiding fallbacks due to inventory inaccuracies. 

Provides Professional Systems  

If the system you currently have in place for your inventory management is messy and inconvenient, it’s time to consider an inventory management system. Many inventory management systems provide you with helpful solutions for every step of the process. This can lead to cost and time effective solutions throughout your company.  

Many inventory management systems are complete with barcode maker and scanner technologies. This will resolve the tedious and time-consuming process of recording the ins and outs of inventory. Giving your products a barcode that will connect to your inventory tracker has many benefits. 

This will allow for a more convenient flow throughout your workday. Your employees can scan a product to adjust inventory rather than trying to find it in your system.

This adjustment may seem small but can allow your employees to move onto more valuable tasks. This switch can increase overall company productivity. 

Allows for Growth 

Does your company have multiple locations? Or are you hoping to grow your company in the future? An inventory management company can help you track your inventory across various sites. 

This will allow you to know the inventory status at both individual locations. It will also give you an overview of your companies inventory numbers as a whole.

A centralized database can help business owners and inventory managers track each branch’s progress. It can also help to make bulk reorders if both of your offices require certain products. 

Smarter Small Business Inventory Management 

If you don’t already have a small business inventory management system, you should consider one for your company today. As you can see, there are so many ways that a successful inventory management system can assist your small business.

Increase your efficiency, accuracy, and payroll dollars with an inventory management system that will allow you to grow your business with ease. 

Are you looking for a reliable supplier to get your companies reorders from? Contact us today to see how we can help!

The engineering industry is continuously evolving. New technologies are being utilized more than ever in various sectors, and it’s easy to be left behind. Here are seven top technology trends in engineering – keep reading to explore them!

1. 3D Printing

Perhaps the most notable trend in technology, 3D printing, or additive manufacturing, is really changing the engineering industry. Quick, efficient, and cost-effective, the technology is frequently utilized in engineering design and can be used for everything from isotopic printing to producing prototypes.

2. Digital Twins

Creating a virtual replica of a design before you build the real thing can be a life-saver, as it allows you to iron out any issues without wasting time and money on physical resources. As digital twins use algorithms, you can get information about how your design will operate before you make it.

3. Internet of Things

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a major upcoming technology trend both inside and outside engineering, and for a good reason too. Smart technology can increase efficiency and productivity in the design stage and helps to improve safety also. The use of smart devices in engineering forms part of the IoT and is vital in creating smart designs.

4. Generative Design

By using artificial intelligence (more on this below), the generative design creates solutions that humans alone would not be able to come up with. Generative design algorithms set specific parameters, and every possible combination is generated for human engineers to look at. It’s used in the production of regular everyday items as well as designs like aircraft, so you’re sure to find a place for it somewhere.

5. Artificial Intelligence

 Artificial intelligence (AI) is all around us. Collaboration between humans and AI leads to better designs and production, and AI invites changes like natural language processing, automation, and robotics. It may take some time to get used to, but AI can bring significant changes to your work.

6. Robotics

As a trend, robotics is on the rise, as robots bring so many advantages to engineering. Robots can be programmed to do more than you might expect, helping you with both physical and mental tasks. Increase safety and productivity by using robotics, as robots can now think intelligently and independently through the use of AI.

7. Sustainable Architecture

Environmental awareness has been more prominent recently, and it encompasses the engineering industry. Eco-friendly technologies like embedded sensors and intelligent electrical grids can now be used to produce more sustainable, eco-conscious designs that are also smart. 

Making the Most of Top Technology Trends

These are the top technology trends to consider for the future if you’re hoping to stay ahead in the game and keep on innovating. How are you able to utilize them for the best results?

If you’d like to find out anything else from us or get in touch, you can contact us today.

Do you run a warehouse that deals in spare parts? Are you struggling with ways to run it more efficiently?

Perhaps you feel you’re not organized enough and often losing track of things.

You can streamline your spare part warehouse to make it run smoothly and become more successful. Read below to learn five great tips.

1. Operations Strategy

Safety should come first with your operation strategy, but after that, you can do some things to help your spare part warehouse run better.

You can run your spare part store from a reactionary or predictive position. You don’t want to fall into the reactionary category. This will put you behind the eight-ball, so to speak and slow down your operation.

You want to come from a predictive point of view to set yourself up for success. Sure, there can be things that come up, and you have to react, but predicting problems before they happen is a better way to deal with it.

A great way to use predictive spare part inventory management is to collect and analyze your data. Then, you’ll see the entire scope of your operation and be able to make decisions on a broad scale first. Then narrow it down to specifics.

2. Control Your Inventory

The best way to do this is to have two categories for your spare part warehouse. You should have a critical and non-critical category. If a part is critical to a machine’s operation or function, then choose always to have it on hand.

If the part is not, you don’t always have to have it stocked. This will cut down unnecessary overhead and give you better inventory control.

Review the two categories every three or four months. Also, make sure you store the spare parts in the correct sections.

3. Stockout

You can’t eliminate stockout issues, but you can identify the major cause of it and fix it. Make sure you record out of stock parts when they happen.

Keep a tight log of these and evaluate it regularly. Things have to be organized correctly. Also, keep in mind that the biggest reason for stockout is a delay in the supply chain.

4. Lead Time

If you want to run your stock operation successfully, you’ll need a comprehensive understanding of lead times. This will help you figure out which parts you need to stock. If you don’t run this properly, you can suffer financial losses from downtime.

Determine which of your parts have extended lead times and make sure they are stocked at all times. Keep in mind off-brand parts can save you here.

These can often be obtained quicker. As long as the machine can use substitute parts, then you’re all set. 

5. Calculate

Occasional equipment failure is perhaps inevitable. However, you can soften this blow be calculating your downtime. You should know this down to the hour. For example, one hour of downtime will cost you say $5,000.

If the part takes one day to arrive, that’s 24 hours times $5,000. This needs to be taken into consideration and incorporated into your books.

The Spare Part Fix

These five tips will make you a successful spare part warehouse manager. You’ll have an efficient, streamlined warehouse that will make your life easier and business much more successful.

Click here to contact us for products and services.

Running a plant or production line is similar to building a machine; each part and piece needs to be in order, or nothing will work. 

Refining your practices for handling spare parts can be overwhelming. With so many shifts in markets or changes in demand, you need flexibility and good management. You need a drive always to improve your methods.

There are lots of ways to manage your spare parts in production. Some shine above the rest. Let’s break down some of the best practices in spare parts.

Getting the Most Out of Spare Parts

Spare parts are a big part of industrial work. You never want too few when you need them, but too many, and you have potential money lying around doing nothing. 

No matter what each part is for, there are sound ways to keep track of them. Try and integrate these four best practices into your spare parts management. 

1. Using CMMS Technology

In this digital age, there is little need for the older analog methods of categorizing and managing. CMMS, which stands for computerized maintenance management software, are various management software bundles.

These hosts of applications organize your stock, schedule resupplies and keeps a central location for all your documents. This type of software has made massive engineering plants possible.

Finding the best CMMS technology to use can come down to preference, but learning and integrating one into your system will be vital to your spare parts organization. 

2. Performing Reviews of Essential Parts

Nothing changes as fast as technology. As new equipment comes out and industry priorities shift, you will need to alter the spare parts you deal with.

Sometimes this will be gradual while other times it will be in dramatic changes. Either way, performing periodic reviews will let you adjust your needs as they come. 

3. Counting Stocks to Keep Discrepancies in Line

Even with the powerful CMMS technology, discrepancies will happen. Whatever the oversight is or why it came to be, doing periodic counts of stocks will help to minimize them.

Timing your stock counting right before deliveries of new items can help you integrate the new items into the system faster. If discrepancies keep happening, then that is a strong sign that a bigger issue may be to blame with incoming and outgoing orders.

4. Maintain Proper Parts Storage and Care

The final practice to keep your spare parts in a manageable position is storage and care. Each part should have organization and protection so that it is never lost or broken. 

You can do this in any number of ways. Dedicate storage areas for each different piece is a great start. For fragile pieces, add padding to the storage area.

Make sure everything has clear labels, and whoever interacts with your spare parts needs to place them in the right container every time. 

Keeping Your Production Moving

Dealing with spare parts takes an eye for both management and detail. With the right software and an aim for constant reevaluation, you can keep all the pieces together.

Kor-Pak has a variety of industrial parts for any number of machines and pieces. Keeping your own pieces running is key, so when you need quality parts, you know where to head. Contact us today for more information!

Industrial machinery is responsible for a significant part of society’s functioning. And, it’s incredible to realize that all of that relies on one often overlooked detail: machinery lubricant.

Without proper lubricant, those billions or trillions of dollars worth of machinery holding up our society would quickly shear themselves into disrepair and uselessness.

Read on to learn about three kinds of industrial machinery lubricants and how they work!

Types of Lubricants and Their Uses

There are essentially two classes of lubricants — oils and greases. Oils come in synthetic, mineral, and vegetable categories. Greases can also be made with various base oils, but are thicker.

Vegetable oil lubricants are less commonly used in the industrial machinery field. We’ll look primarily at synthetic lubricants, mineral lubricants, and grease lubricants, starting with synthetic lubricants.

Synthetic Machine Lubricant

Synthetic oils cannot be found in the natural environment. Instead, they are created by scientists and engineers to fulfill extreme need purposes.

Some industrial processes create incredible extremes in heat and friction. Natural oils may be able to cut it for ordinary purposes, but they won’t provide the extremely high flash point, fire resistance, and other qualities of synthetic oils.

While synthetic oil would be perfectly functional for everyday use, it’s probably best to stick to natural alternatives in such cases. Synthetic lubricants can be highly toxic and require a great deal of effort to dispose of properly. On top of that, they can be costly.

Mineral Oil Lubricant

Mineral oils are created out of crude oil. Depending on the level of performance you need out of them, they can only partially processed, or they can be highly refined.

Within the mineral oil category, there are various types, like naphthenic oils, which are suitable for processes that create only moderate temperatures.

Due in part to their natural occurrence in nature, mineral oils are far less toxic than synthetic oils. They are also far cheaper. Plus, mineral oils can provide just as high a level of performance as synthetic oils.

As long as you use them for standard industrial applications that don’t create extreme environments, a mineral lubricant can provide top tier performance.

Grease Lubricant

While oils can come in different levels of viscosity, or thickness, they are all essentially liquids. Grease is closer to a solid, which gives it several pros and cons.

If a contaminant touches oil, the oil may pick it up and allow it to float throughout the rest of the lubricant. Grease, on the other hand, will seal contaminants out.

Oil leaks are a fairly common occurrence, while grease sticks to the surfaces it’s applied to, so it can’t fall away.

On the other hand, grease’s greater thickness means that it creates more friction than oil. This leads to higher heating and lower speeds in industrial processes.

Find the Best Machinery Lubricant For Your Needs

For more information on all the products and services that we offer to help your workplace run as effectively as possible, check out our other pages.

Industrial machinery is steadily becoming more high-tech, with cloud, Internet of Things, and other new technologies continually improving performance. However, that doesn’t mean you can skimp on old-fashioned machine maintenance.

Even the most high-tech machinery still needs ordinary maintenance. Poorly-maintained equipment can result in heavy equipment failures and even the risk of injury to employees. 

Not sure if you’re maintaining your heavy-duty equipment correctly? Here are the top tips to keep in mind for machine maintenance. 

Check Fluids

Checking machine fluids can help you stop problems before they start. Fluids also need routine filling, even when everything’s working correctly. 

Check fluid levels and conditions to get an idea of how well your machines are functioning. Regular fluid analysis will help you catch problems early on before they cause big issues. If you notice fluid levels changing faster or slower than usual, that’s another possible sign of a problem. 

Cultivate Familiarity

Good maintenance means not waiting until something goes wrong. The more familiar you are with your machines when they’re working well, the easier it will be to catch an issue.

Familiarize yourself with equipment manuals to learn what’s normal and what isn’t. Your manuals will also help you know when to schedule routine service. 

Even if you don’t operate the machine regularly, someone does. Get your whole team on board with cultivating familiarity with the equipment. 

Record Everything

Keeping a record of maintenance, breakdowns, and everything else that happens with your equipment creates a valuable body of knowledge.

From the moment you get a machine, start a record of everything notable about it. Modern technology makes it easy to keep this information online, where it can be accessed and updated by anyone involved with that machine. 

Any scheduled servicing, unexpected repairs, and other notable events can go into this record. When something seems wrong with a machine, looking at its history can help you get an idea of what to do next. 

Make a Preventative Program

It’s clear that the essential machine maintenance is preventative. If you wait until something’s seriously wrong, you’ve waited too long. 

Make a scheduled servicing and preventative maintenance program to keep things running smoothly. Replace parts, inspect the equipment, refill fluids, and otherwise care for your machinery as needed. 

It’s also good to periodically test the performance as part of this program. These tests will show when something is starting to go wrong before it becomes a serious problem. 

Don’t Delay: Start Machine Maintenance Now 

If you’ve been slow to do machine maintenance, your equipment is probably breaking down more than it should. Don’t wait to implement these practices. The sooner you begin, the more money you can save. 

Maintenance doesn’t just save money by preventing equipment failures, though. It also helps keep you and your employees safe by avoiding dangerous mishaps. Workplace safety is one of the most important aspects of working with heavy machinery, and maintenance is a crucial part of safety. 

Doing maintenance doesn’t mean you’ll never need to repair your equipment, but it will make those repairs less frequent. Are you looking for repair help? Check out our services here!

Is waterjet technology the best choice for your cutting needs? In most cases, yes, it is.

For starters, it’s very cost-efficient and environmentally-friendly. It cuts with top-notch power and precision. 

It’s safe to use for almost every cutting job and won’t cause unwanted damage or warping. Beyond this, waterjet cutting avoids many problematic side-effects that other cutting methods cause.

And that’s only the half of it. Learn all about the fantastic advantages of waterjet cutting in full detail from this guide.

1. Cold Cutting

Cutting torches require heat and actual flame to cut. These two things can be problematic, causing collateral damage to heat-sensitive objects nearby. Warping, for instance, is a very common problem with hot cutting.

In other situations, a cutting torch could even cause mass destruction and death. For example, one obviously can’t use a torch for any cutting job that’s close to highly-combustible gasses and materials.

For jobs like these, cutting cold is imperative. Thus, a waterjet provides a perfect alternative when a torch is out of the question.

2. Eco-Friendliness

Furthermore, there are no greenhouse gasses or toxic fumes emitted from waterjet cutting, as there are with other cutting methods. Neither does it produce hazardous dust.

Waterjets also use no harmful chemicals, only naturally-occurring/recyclable water and abrasive minerals like garnet. Plus, the cold cutting of waterjets prevents the dross waste, and slag deformation that plasma or laser cutting can cause.

3. Fast and Efficient Cutting

Waterjets are extremely powerful and cut easily through most materials, more easily than other cutting methods in most cases. Because of this, waterjets can get far more cutting done in far less time compared to other options.

This also means that waterjets are efficient at conserving materials (the water plus abrasive compound). Most first-time waterjet users are surprised at how much of these materials are leftover when the job is completed.

4. Low Cost

Because of the factors mentioned above, waterjets are typically your cheapest cutting option. Obviously, the water doesn’t cost much, especially when the waterjet is so efficient at conserving it. 

The abrasive compound can be a little pricey. But again, the waterjet is very efficient at conserving this as well. 

It’s efficiency also means less time spent cutting. That means less money spent on hourly wages or equipment leases.

5. Precision Cutting

Waterjets cut very precisely with tolerances around +/- 0.005″. However, tolerances vary among different manufacturers. Still, generally, waterjets cut net-shape or near-net-shape with little-to-no secondary processing required.

Waterjets can cut omnidirectionally. And they can usually perforate the material to be cut without the need for starting holes.

6. An Extremely Smooth Cut

Another great benefit is that waterjets smooth as they cut. Other cutting methods require smoothing edges as a secondary step after cutting. Waterjets save time by doing both of these steps at once.

The Benefits of Waterjet Technology

Waterjet technology saves you money, gets the job done fast, and spares the environment (and your project site) from unnecessary harm. For all these reasons and more, a waterjet machine could be the perfect tool for your cutting needs. Consider a waterjet for your next cutting project.

For more about waterjets, check out Water Jet Cutting and Its Many Uses in Machining and Fabrication.