Mechanical Technology February 2015

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Mechanical Technology — February 2015 1
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Iwrite this on another day of Stage 2 load shedding – due to “a shortage
of generation capacity as additional units have had to be taken out of
service for unplanned maintenance due to technical faults,” says the
Eskom statement. More specifically, it continues, “in the morning we
mentioned that Majuba Power Station’s Unit 3, Duvha’s Unit 2 and Koeberg’s
Unit 1 are on unplanned maintenance. Now we have two more units that have had to be taken off
service. At the Kriel Power Station, Unit 3 experienced a boiler tube leak, and Camden’s Unit 4 has
a generator hydrogen leak.” Am I excessively cynical or has the phrase ‘technical fault’ suddenly
become a blame shifter?
An Eskom tweet posted at 13:02 on Wednesday, February 4 reads “load shedding will move into
Stage 2 from 14h00. This is as a result of power station units not returning to service as planned.”
Is this a reference to planned maintenance over running or unplanned maintenance taking longer
than expected? And how cool does the utility think it is to explain itself via Twitter?
Eskom CEO Tshediso Matona, speaking last month at an emergency press briefing, said, “Eskom
has reached a point that does not allow us to ignore the health of our plants.” When, I ask, did it
ever become acceptable to ignore the health of plants?
Mechanical Technology has published a maintenance feature for as long as I can remember – the
feature certainly predates my involvement in the magazine. In that time, we have consistently and
proudly advocated the shift towards condition monitoring and preventative and proactive approaches,
to maximise uptime and equipment life. I am convinced that few responsible engineers – including
those working for Eskom – would argue against the importance of responsible maintenance approaches.
Yet here we are, in a situation where a critical national asset is near breaking point owing to neglect.
As from this month’s issue, we have invited Mario Kuisis of Martec to submit a column for our
proactive maintenance, lubrication and contamination management feature. We look forward to
this becoming a quarterly feature. Martec describes itself as “a reliability enhancement specialist”
and in his opening column Kuisis points towards five basic approaches to maintenance – passive,
reactive, preventative, predictive and proactive – all of which have their proper place depending
on the risk, impact and cost of the component or machine breakdown. Kuisis points towards the
different approaches used for component breakdown on a car: passive for a headlamp failure,
because you can always replace it in the morning; reactive for punctures – we keep a spare for use
when we get stranded. We change the engine oil regularly because we know that this will prevent
premature engine failure and we monitor the engine oil pressure and temperature, because the
engine can be destroyed if we fail to pick up a lubrication or overheating problem. But, in spite of
the numerous examples of good maintenance practices and technologies, not all vehicle owners
treat their assets with respect.
In the context of taking care of expensive materials handling equipment such as bucket wheel
excavators, Flip Winkel of indurad points out in this month’s innovative engineering feature that
“when you buy a modern car, you get an automatic park assist system based on a proximity sensor
to help you position your car safely. But on R500-million bucket wheel excavators there are seldom
any operator-assist features incorporated into the design”. Are we really that desperate to secure the
least possible price? Are we willing to take more risks with our critical industrial and infrastructure
assets than we are with our own personal vehicles?
In our cover story this month, Fritz Fourie and David Main outline Hansen Transmissions’ global
drive towards culture change. The group has adopted the KATA philosophy associated with Toyota’s
success. Main says: “KATA is about continual improvement. In the context of an organisation, it is
about reinforcing and repeating the things that are done well and identifying areas of weakness.”
We have a skills shortage in South Africa that is, undoubtedly, affecting our ability to maintain our
assets. More importantly, we seem to have lost the simple old-fashioned value of looking after our
property. At our power plants and within our water, road, rail and building infrastructures, a culture
change is desperately needed. Maintenance is not about fixing ‘technical faults’. Its meaning should
be taken from the dictionary – preservation, conservation, continuation, continuance, continuity,
keeping up, carrying on, prolongation and perpetuation – and applied literally.
While advanced maintenance technologies are available, as are appropriately skilled people if
maintenance service providers are taken into account, KATA-type philosophies and a culture change
are essential if we are to restore reliability and credibility to our critical infrastructure plants and
organisations. The current Eskom crisis brings this need into stark focus.
Peter Middleton
Reliability, maintenance and
culture change
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