How Lubrication Strategies Cut Costs at the Plant
BY Clay Calk
Subpar lubrication costs producers in industrial settings
Editor’s Note: The Focus on Performance series from AsphaltPro Magazine allows OEMs and service providers to highlight professionals in the industry who have improved efficiencies and the bottom line through best practices and performance. This month’s installment, featuring Peak Oilfield Service Company, Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, focuses on predictive maintenance strategies.
Industrial facilities face many lubrication-related challenges, particularly with the demanding conditions found in industries such as mining or construction. The biggest challenges are contamination from dirt, infiltration of moisture and incorrect lubricant choice for the application. Failure to deal with these issues increases wear on mechanical equipment, resulting in greater rates of equipment downtime and higher maintenance expenses. Proper lubrication practices, with examples below, lead to better equipment performance and ultimately result in substantial cost savings.
3 Common Challenges
About 75% of mechanical wear on industrial equipment is due to contamination from outside dirt. Internal friction and outside particles are destructive to metal. Circulating solid particulates in the lubricant risks damaging the base oil, stripping away additives and harming critical components. The best practice is to begin by filtering the lubricant—even when new—because newly delivered lubricants in pails, drums or totes tend to have elevated particle counts.
Before and after filtration, oil samples should be sent to the lab for two reasons.
- First, to verify that the product inside the container matches the label and product type ordered.
- Second, to confirm that filtration is effectively accomplishing the specific ISO Cleanliness Codes for the assets these new oils are going in.
The second biggest challenge is water or moisture. Ridding the oil of moisture is critical to provide the best overall performance. Moisture can lead to lubricant degradation and equipment damage, particularly in environments like surface mining and construction where equipment is frequently exposed to water and humidity.
The third challenge is making sure plant personnel are storing the lubricants properly and putting the right lubricant into the right application. Lubrication Engineers has conducted surveys that examine lubricants used in assets and cross references them with original equipment manufacturer (OEM) instructions and manuals. The studies have found that about 12-14% of lubricants being used are either the wrong type or the wrong viscosity, which may lead to more frequent oil changes or speed up the oil’s rate of oxidation. Once the lubricant film is ruptured, it cannot protect the critical component of the asset and may result in faster mean time between failure (MTBF).
Reviewing the health of the asset and the oil, and conducting an analysis that includes fluid properties, wear metals, particle count, contaminants (fuel, soot and moisture) and contaminant metals (silica and coolant) will ensure the asset’s integrity is not being jeopardized. Failing to do this will contribute to the need for more frequent oil changes or repairs.
Within 18 months, they had achieved 50% total savings in cost per run hour.
Extend Equipment Lifespan
To meet the challenges, facilities should consider the use of higher quality lubricants, which maintain the integrity of oil so it will last longer. Maintaining oil’s viscosity without breaking down is key; once you lose the integrity of lubricating oil, you are risking more wear on metal. With a higher quality lubricant, viscosity is maintained for a much longer period of time.
Using high-quality lubricants will result in fewer oil changes, repairs, reactive labor and unplanned downtime. Implementing best practices and protecting assets by using higher quality lubricants will result in greater savings across repairs, because they happen less frequently. Facilities achieve lower overall costs with higher quality lubricants paired with preventive and predictive maintenance strategies.
Using the right lubricants and lubrication strategies will allow oil to maintain its health for the longest period. This maximizes return on that lubricated asset by reducing labor, parts in the storeroom, and the cost associated with asset availability and downtime.
In addition to the use of quality lubrication products, the use of predictive or preventive maintenance plays a key role in optimizing lubrication efficiency. Strategies should be developed to predict when a piece of equipment is expected to fail, then schedule and plan maintenance on the asset to avoid that failure. Many industries are trending toward scheduling oil changes with predictive condition-based methods versus older time-based methods.
These strategies can be helped by a thorough evaluation of a facility’s lubrication program. For example, Lubrication Engineers offers its Xpert Lubrication Benchmark Audit, a one-day walkthrough that looks at a facility’s lubrication program and ranks it compared to industry standards and best practices. Audit categories include lubrication best practices, asset and lubricant identification, storage and handling, oil analysis and sampling, contamination control, filtration, training, skill development and certifications, software, CMMS and EAM, and safety and accessibility.
Education and technical support are critical. Facilities should ensure their staff is properly trained in lubrication fundamentals, so they can understand and respond to OEM lubrication recommendations and specifications.
Peak Improvements
Often budget is brought up as the reason higher quality lubricants are not used. In fact, in many cases, switching lubricants may lead to a reduced need for electrical energy or reduced temperature, yielding electricity savings. Here are two examples that showcase the ROI achieved from investment in higher quality lubricants.
Example – Fleet maintenance program
Peak Oilfield Service Company, located on Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, partnered with Lubrication Engineers to evaluate the company’s fleet maintenance program with a goal of implementing a more proactive predictive maintenance program. The evaluation included benchmarking the current program to understand the overall cost per mile to operate the fleet.
Peak’s fleet is comprised of more than 2,000 pieces of equipment, including service trucks; wheel loaders; haul, vacuum and water trucks; snow blowers; diesel generators; and more. Prior to its new reliability program, Peak performed all service truck engine oil changes every 200 hours, and all heavy-duty, off-road equipment engine oil changes every 300 hours. Repeated trials and evaluation of LE’s Monolec® Engine Oils showed that the new product extended drains out to 1,500+ hours. Some equipment had extended oil drains as far out as 2,200 hours, and oil analysis demonstrated that the Monolec Engine oil still maintained its viscosity and TBN.
Following consistent trial successes, Peak switched all its engines to LE’s Monolec Engine Oils, establishing 1,200-hour drain intervals for all mobile equipment. Within 18 months, they had achieved 50% total savings in cost per run hour; 46% savings in engine oil usage costs; 67% savings in engine oil disposal costs; 76% savings in annual engine oil change labor costs; and 76% savings in annual oil change downtime costs.
Example – Drill rig transportation vehicles
Peak Oil also used enhanced lubrication to solve a problem with frequent costly bearing failures in its custom-made John Deere Rolligons, responsible for transporting drill rigs to remote drill sites in Alaska. Due to the harsh environmental conditions, these roller bearings are subject to -60°F temperatures, extreme high loading, low RPMs (8-10), dirt, moisture and idle time.
The lubricant in use was a mineral grade lithium-thickened NLGI 2 EP grease that would wax up when exposed to freezing temperatures, allowing the oil to run out of the thickener and bearing, while at the same time allowing the ingress of dirt and moisture. The complete saturation of the bearing and housing caused excessive rust, lubricant degradation, bearing starvation, and frequent bearing failures.
Lubrication Engineers recommended its heavy-duty synthetic NLGI 2 EP grease containing proprietary additives. Almaplex Ultra-Syn Lubricant (1299) is designed for optimum performance under extreme operating conditions. In 2017, Peak had experienced a total of 114 roller bearing failures in its Rolligon fleet with the previous commercial grease. After switching, that number was reduced to only 24 failures in 2018—a 73% reduction. At a cost of $1,450 per bearing and considering parts and labor, Peak saved approximately $196,200.
Proper lubrication practices are crucial for facilities to achieve cost savings and improve equipment performance. The challenges of contamination, moisture and incorrect lubricant usage can lead to downtime and maintenance expenses. However, by implementing best practices such as using higher quality lubricants, maintaining proper storage and handling, and integrating predictive maintenance strategies, facilities can significantly reduce these costs. This approach not only improves equipment reliability but also contributes to a more efficient and sustainable operation.
Clay Calk is the director of market development for Lubrication Engineers.