Machine Repair and Maintenance to Extend Longevity

Industrial Machines / Jason

Whether you are working in a manufacturing unit or involved in a mining project, one thing is for sure, you have experienced downtime. Worse is when this happens during the most unexpected time. This equates to great financial costs and can even lead the business to lose its competitive edge.

In many businesses, the use of heavy machines is integral in businesses. With the help of machine repair and proactive maintenance, unplanned downtime can be avoided. At the same time, this ensures great performance, while saving energy and fuel for a safer workplace.

Machine Repair for Longevity

Replace Lubricants Regularly

All heavy machines are dependent on lubricants to function better. Lubricants help reduce friction in the moving parts. As a result, wear and tear are decreased. In addition, they help keep the inside parts of the machine clean by preventing any soot buildup.

Clean the Machine Properly and Thoroughly

Proper and thorough cleaning is as important as the use of lubricants. But a lot of organizations pay less attention to this. Dirt, dust, and soot can clog filters, cooling fans, vents, and seals thus decreasing the performance of the machine. Be sure to check every element of the machine.

One of the best ways to clean your machine is to use a hose that can forcefully remove any trace of dirt. But there are some parts that can be tricky to clean. For this, you have to use special cleaning methods like steam cleaning, pressure washing, and acid washing.

Check your Equipment for Wear and Tear

There are various factors that could cause wear and tear through the time of using the machine. This includes accidents, ageing, poor operating habits, and environmental factors. Although you take all the necessary precautions, ageing would eventually affect the important components of the machine. This is why it is important to check all parts for any sign of wear and tear.

In addition to mechanical components, you also need to check electrical wires and electronics. The high temperature that arise from extended use, environmental factors like water and dust, and vibrations from de-aligned belts and gears can cause damage to the wires. You need to check alternators, starters, and other electrical parts to guarantee a smooth performance.

Do Not Exceed Performance Specifications

Every machine comes with its own set of performance limitations like maximum load capacity, temperature, range of operating pressure, etc. With this, you need to see to it that you read and understand the operator’s manual so you can make the most out of your equipment.

Exceeding the performance limit would lead to wear and tear and reduced longevity. Also, it can compromise the efficiency of the machine. With it performs poorly, work and productivity will be affected which can mean a great loss for the company.

Repair and maintenance should be performed to avoid further and more serious problems. When these things are done properly and regularly, you can expect your machine to be of service to you for a very long time.

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Sonic Drilling Pointers for Environmental and Geotechnical Drilling Works

Industrial Machines / Jason

In the last 20 years, sonic drilling has displayed impressive growth in terms of acceptance and popularity. Two primary key elements are paramount to this growth. The first one has something to do with the development of seasoned and skilled drillers who will be delegated to perform this job and second to this are the latest advances and developments in the sonic drilling technology.

Provided that a sonic drilling operator or staff is highly skilled, he is not going to have a hard time achieving high production rates. He is also likely to obtain exceptionally good quality samples from an array of subsurface conditions. The sonic drill rigs are capable of reaching greater depths while at the same time trying to get near 100% in sitecore samples.

Know When You Should Make Use of Sonic Drill Rig

Having a deeper understanding of where and when to take advantage of the sonic drilling technique over other available but traditional methods of drilling is paramount to delivering a cost-effective outcome to your customer.

We have below 2 practical reasons why you should pick this drilling technology instead, sonic drill, over many other methods.

Drilling projects requiring continuous site samples that need to be collected — this contrary to reverse circulation drilling. The chips in this method of drilling are collected instead.
In situations where you need to veer away from air and fluid while the drilling process is ongoing. Sonic drilling does not require both air or fluid. This explains the reason why it is the method of choice for geo-construction, geotechnical and environmental applications. Significant cost savings are likely to materialize in the sonic type of drilling.

These are the kind of drilling projects that will necessitate you to shell out a good amount of money. You also need to exert some effort in your work here so that you can dispose of your drill cuttings or investigation derived waste or IDW. Drilling dry minimizes the anticipated amount of liquid against the rotary type of drilling (drill water/mud).

For those drilling projects with observable unconsolidated formations of the ground are encountered, sonic type of drilling is the method of choice to use here. It is very good at handling pebbles, boulders and everything in between while giving the borehole that needed an amount of integrity by virtue of continuous casing process.

Maintain Your Sonic Rig

It is very important to see to it that your tooling and sonic rig are always in tip-top shape or optimal running condition. It is paramount to the long term productive life of sonic drilling.

To help you identify and fix issues right away even before downtime for your equipment occurs, preventive maintenance should be observed and followed. Therefore, see to it that you have your sonic rig checked and do it regularly.

Keep Safety in Check

In any drill site facility, the safety of everyone working there is very important. Promote and inculcate in the minds of your team culture of safety. Encourage your drill crews to always think first, a hundredfold, before taking action. By this measure, every single one of them will be trained to focus their mind and energy to the task they have at hand. It should always be one task at a time.

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The Aerospace Industry in Relation to WaterJet Cutting

Industrial Machines / Jason

Do you find it surprising that the aerospace industry has found several practical applications for water jet cutting and are using those to help advance its own purposes?

If you have seen some of the projects that this industry is up to, you will realize that people working in this sphere are not just into the production of aircraft themselves, aircraft engines or any of the parts related to those but they are also involved in scientific developments, military solutions, and a host of other components that help in defining our current world as “modern”.

The aerospace industry has made it very clear that it has no room for error. There is no possible way that it can tolerate it. Hence, the reason why it employed the versatility and the accuracy of water jet cutting is to help them in the production of a wide spectrum of components. This would be ranging from turbine blades to jet engines, then down to the production of different types of control panels and so much more.

What is even more surprising is the fact that water jet cutting machines have been around since the 1970s, as mentioned earlier, and yet so many of us are under the impression that this is yet another new technology when it is not.

The Aerospace Industry Needs High Level of Precision

We know for a fact that the aerospace industry is diverse and multifaceted. It covers many different aspects of our life as a nation, starting from military solutions that are designed for national defense to the production of commercial aircrafts.

The production of aircraft components necessitates them to be machine-fabricated so as to ensure they are made with utmost quality. They should be produced with the highest quality because even the slightest flaw or error in their production could lead to tragedy.

The machining of various parts needed by the aerospace industry, notable for their superior quality and strength, is more complex than what we think and presents more challenges that must be surmounted as opposed to the production of other kinds of consumer goods.

It is also excessively stringent on the aspect of traceability, and stricter on tolerances. This signifies that the industry is in dire need of machining processes that can go at par with its required elaborate production levels. In the face of these manufacturing demands at such high standards, the water jet cutting machine came into the picture, sweeping away any competition there is.

What Can Waterjet Technology Offer to the Aerospace Industry?

So, how did the water jet machine manufacturers managed to position themselves as a reliably precise and strong contender in as far as meeting the tight aerospace production demands?

For the most part, the waterjet industry found themselves in a favorable position due to their level of adaptability. Besides, the fact that you can tweak and make adjustments to the abrasive waterjets so that they will conform to any specific cutting requirements, there is also a room for its standardization to allow for more precise and uniform production of materials, even if it is going to be a large-scale basis.

Waterjet technology is adaptable across different material cutting projects, as well as many different types of materials. This cutting-edge technology can cut through a wide array of substances — this would also include those materials that are susceptible to acquire damage from other styles of fabrication — such as:

Brass
Glass
Plastic
Aluminum
Carbon fiber
Rubber
Alloys
Stainless Steel
Copper
Titanium
Foam

The underlying reason why the waterjet cutting machine can seamlessly cut through a wide array of materials is because it makes use of a cool-cutting process. This signifies that it will not produce a heat-affected zone (HAZ).

Like for instance, when using laser cutting technology it will pose a certain level of difficulty when dealing with materials that are known to have a high level of thermal conductivity, such as aluminum or steel.

On the other hand, the use of water jet cutting machines eliminate these issues and completely eradicates the building up of heat-affected zones. The presence of HAZ can be detrimental because it can put the structural integrity of your cut material on the line due to microscopic cracks it makes.

It is also natural for waterjet cutting machines to work alongside technologies on automation and control. Doing so helps in facilitating a more straightforward and standardized production. With respect to the high level of precision which the aerospace manufacturing requires, this is going to become a huge boon to the companies that are involved in the industry.

What is the Future of Aerospace?

Advanced and high-technology computer systems can significantly help in seeing to it that parts are carefully and fully constructed, paying good attention even to the minute details. While the use of laser cutting machines may also involve top-of-the-line computer systems, the fact remains that they can still impose heat on your materials. This will render your materials subject to warping and when this occurs, it may necessitate you to implement secondary processing to further refine the said structural flaw.

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