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All articles listed in reverse chronological order.

by Ash Norton Leave a Comment

What does it mean to Engineer with Impact?

What does it mean to Engineer with Impact?

If you’ve hung around this site, subscribed to the email list, or followed me on social media, you know that I am obsessed with engineering impact.  It is how I close every email and is the focus of nearly every article and post.  Heck, my tagline is Engineer with Impact. But what does that really mean?  And how do we know if we are doing it?

As engineers, we pride ourselves on the ability to problem-solve.  And rightfully so. We are dang good at it!  We’ve spent years, if not decades of our lives, honing the craft of working through problem after problem, getting a precise solution.  But sometimes we get so focused on solving the problem in front of us that we don’t stop to think if the problem is really…well…the problem.  And when we fail to solve the right problems, we fail to Engineer with Impact. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, Engineering Leadership, on Leadership & Career

by Adam Bahret Leave a Comment

Pushing Too Hard

Pushing Too Hard

It’s early in the boating season.  It’s a beautiful Saturday and wee’re wakeboarding, My wife is driving.  I am getting ready to line up to jump the wake and all of a sudden she cuts the throttle and then guns it again.  I just let go of the rope and wait for her to come around so I can find out if it was the dirty dishes left on the  couch or beard shavings carelessly sprinkled on her face soap.  She said the boat just stuttered without her touching the throttle.  Hmmm  really? As we are talking the boat just stalls. Ughh!, and we are not close to the house.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Apex Ridge, Articles, on Product Reliability

by Doug Plucknette 1 Comment

Quality, Reliability & Useful Life

Quality, Reliability & Useful Life

The Impact of Precision Installation & Maintenance

Over the last several years I have been working on and off with customers to among other things build a maintenance strategy for their equipment that will insure the designed reliability of their assets.

A while back I was asked by one of these customers to come in perform several RCM (Reliability Centered Maintenance) analyses on some new equipment that was struggling to deliver the expected/promised production rates. As the team worked its way through the process of identifying failure modes I continued to ask the following questions: [Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, on Maintenance Reliability, RCM Blitz

by James Kovacevic Leave a Comment

Building a Reliability Culture

Building a Reliability Culture

Laying The Groundwork for a Successful Change.

It turns out that you have been deploying the right reliability tools and maintenance practices, but the organization’s culture was preventing or hampering the results.  This is a common scene played out in many organizations, but there is hope.  The culture change will be a long road, as cultures are not changed overnight. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, Maintenance and Reliability, on Maintenance Reliability Tagged With: Change Management, Organizational Management

by Mike Sondalini Leave a Comment

Electric Motor Current Protection Saves Your Plant.

Electric Motor Current Protection Saves Your Plant.

What you will learn from this article. 

  • Electric motor power current draw reflects the motor’s working load.
  • The electric current through a power cable can be measured using the strength of the magnetic field created around the cable.
  • Under-current detection protects against loss of load situations.
  • Over-current detection protects against over-load situations.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, on Maintenance Reliability, Plant Maintenance Tagged With: Electric Motors

by Greg Hutchins Leave a Comment

Enterprise Risk management is Not a Standalone

Enterprise Risk management is Not a Standalone

Guest Post by James Kline (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

Enterprise Risk management is Not a Standalone

When Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) is advocated, it often seems like it is the end all and be all.  However, this is not true.  It is a methodology which assists management in identifying the risk that can prevent an organization from accomplishing it desired goals.  As such, it should be viewed as another management tool in a range of tools.  Perhaps the best presentation of this idea, for local government, is from the city of Oshawa Canada.  This piece discusses how it has integrated ERM into it continuous improvement process. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, CERM® Risk Insights, on Risk & Safety Tagged With: Enterprise Risk Management, ERM

by Robert Allen Leave a Comment

The Definition of Done

The Definition of Done

In my previous article, we reviewed the project approval committee, and emphasized approval to start projects and/or approve projects in-process.

With any type of project oversight, presentations or project schedules are often reviewed.

For a more lean project management approach it would help to consider reviewing the actual deliverables, including a mutual understanding of the “definition of done”.

“Definition of done” is the agreed-upon evidence of completion of a process, activity or milestone and usually includes a project deliverable.  Some examples of deliverables might include the project plan, project schedule, documents (requirements document, plans, and reports), analysis, and designs (drawings).  Other considerations can be built-into “definition of done” including compliance, acceptance/sign-off, exceptions and best practices.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, on Leadership & Career, Product Development and Process Improvement Tagged With: customer value, lean product development, Lean Project Management, New Product Development, portfolio analysis, project approval committee, project governance, Project Management, requirements management, resource management

by Dennis Craggs Leave a Comment

Sample Sizes – Surveys

Sample Sizes – Surveys

Sample Sizes – Surveys

Introduction

How many responses are needed for a survey? This question requires specifying the desired confidence and the accuracy of the survey results.

The Bernoulli Trial

A Bernoulli trial is an event that has two possible outcomes. Consider the case where the only possible outcomes are success or failure. Let the probability of a success is p and the probability of failure equals q.  The probabilities of all possible events must equal 1, so q = 1-p. These relationships are expressed mathematically as 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, Big Data & Analytics, on Tools & Techniques

by Adam Bahret 2 Comments

Strategy

Strategy

Some leaders mistake “customer focus” to mean they have to serve all of the customers needs or respond to every request from the field. There are multiple needs I have for a vehicle. Because of this I have more than one vehicle. Many manufacturers have tried to make a car or truck that does everything. It often just ends up being a vehicle that is great at nothing. (See Pontiac Aztek)

Know your target. Make goals, make compromises. Don’t commit to high reliability without making sacrifices. Something has to move either it be schedule or new technology development. There are no worse words than a leader saying “…and it must be highly reliable” without discussing the cost of pursuing that reliability goal. Know up front if you are willing to trade reliability for growth of technology or time to market.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Apex Ridge, Articles, on Product Reliability

by James Kovacevic Leave a Comment

Red Alert: Your Culture Is Hurting Your Reliability Efforts

Red Alert: Your Culture Is Hurting Your Reliability Efforts

The Warning Signs That You Need a Culture Change

Imagine working within (or maybe you don’t need to imagine it) an organization in which everything is completely reactive.  You arrive early to try and organize the work for the day, yet only to find out someone else is there doing it. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, Maintenance and Reliability, on Maintenance Reliability Tagged With: Change Management, Organizational Management, People

by Greg Hutchins Leave a Comment

Why Most ERM Systems Don’t Work

Why Most ERM Systems Don’t Work

Guest Post by Greg Caroll (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

So why don’t most Enterprise Risk Management system work?  Simply, they don’t “manage” risk, they just record it.  Manage is a verb not a noun. It is activity not an item.  Making a list might be adequate for those who want to check off regulatory compliance, but it’s does not produce a ROI. [Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, CERM® Risk Insights, on Risk & Safety

by Mike Sondalini 3 Comments

Reliability Centered Maintenance — What is it?

Reliability Centered Maintenance — What is it?

What you will learn from this article. 

  • Meanings of ‘loss of function’, ‘failure modes’ and ‘failure patterns’.
  • RCM provides a way to select the best maintenance strategy for new plant and equipment.
  • PM Optimisation, a shorter version of RCM, is used on existing plant and equipment with sufficient known failure history.
  • The RCM process and procedure is introduced.
  • How to put RCM outcomes into workplace practice.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, on Maintenance Reliability, Plant Maintenance

by Ash Norton Leave a Comment

Priority Setting for Engineers

Priority Setting for Engineers

Setting Priorities – What is your water?

Last year, I had the opportunity to hear Kat Cole, Group President of FOCUS Brands at the time, speak on leadership and the power of setting priorities. Cole shared with us her experiences on a service trip in Africa, in hopes of helping nearby villages with humanitarian efforts, and what it taught her about setting priorities.  In this article, I will recount her experience and provide step-by-step guidance for how you can apply it to your work as an engineer.

Sound good?  Good – let’s get to it!  [Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, Engineering Leadership, on Leadership & Career

by Adam Bahret Leave a Comment

Margin Call

Margin Call

Stress Margin is an interesting topic because our gut reaction is “more is better.”  But more isn’t better. The key is figuring out “How much and where?”  this is where the attention should be paid.

Too much stress margin can end the project the same way making material too thick will turn a plane into nothing more than a crappy diner with too much security.  It’s the correct margin that is needed.  How do we select the correct margin?

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Apex Ridge, Articles, on Product Reliability

by Carl S. Carlson 2 Comments

Understanding FMEA Detection Risk – Part 2

Understanding FMEA Detection Risk – Part 2

Can you find this common error in detection ranking in the intermediate problem in this article? In the advanced problem, the topic of an in-service detection scale will challenge the most experienced readers.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Articles, Inside FMEA, on Tools & Techniques

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