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Technological advances have allowed predictive maintenance (i.e., condition-based maintenance) to overtake preventive maintenance in plant operations. "Look, listen and feel (LLF)" is a condition monitoring technique that improves the reliability of equipment and machinery in manifolds. This monitoring improves the profitability of the manufactured product and increases the safety of complex, hazardous processes and systems.
It is uneconomical to install online condition monitoring tools for each piece of equipment. LLF is an effective condition monitoring tool that identifies the key indicators of machine failures and maintenance requirements. The concept is to look, listen and feel the machines to understand what service is needed at specific times. This concept does not mean to wait until the machine breaks to fix it, but to collect data while the equipment is running, establish threshold limits from original equipment manufacturer (OEM) information, vendor information, best practices or failure history, and schedule maintenance activities accordingly.
The basics of good maintenance consist of:
* Systematic and periodic inspections of equipment and systems
* Recording observations
* Analyzing the recorded observations by the maintenance team.
LLF falls under systematic and periodic inspection of equipment and systems. Individuals who perform LLF must be certified in safety aspects and equipment skills. The concept of LLF can be implemented quickly, but it is important that top management support the program. Management often focuses on the overall safety of the processes and system-i.e., process safety management (PSM). LLF falls under the mechanical integrity of PSM, and is recognized and accepted as a good engineering practice.
Implementing LLF. The first step is to identify the PSM-critical equipment in a unit. PSM-critical equipment is described as equipment that will result in a loss of containment or a process safety incident if it fails. Critical equipment often impacts safety, regulatory compliance, cost and/or operational throughput. These pieces of equipment include vessels, machinery, piping, blowout preventers, critical valves, flares, alarms, interlocks, fire protection equipment and other monitoring, control and response systems. In the hydrocarbon processing industry (HPI), more than 90% of equipment is PSM critical. Therefore, it becomes a primary business objective to maintain and protect PSM-critical equipment effectively. An LLF program is an effective maintenance tool that, along with an existing preventive maintenance and online/offline condition monitoring program, improves...