Predictive Maintenance

Anything mechanical or electrical, in fact, anything that is under stress will cause excessive heat. This is what causes the damage to mechanical or electrical equipment and ultimately, the failure of that particular equipment. The heat build up also helps to detect the impending failure with thermal imaging equipment, scanning with an infrared camera before it actually breaks down.

Here is an example of what the infrared camera identifies.

The operation of Infrared Thermal Imaging equipment is non-contact and will not interfere with a company’s normal day to day running, as the technique requires that the equipment to be scanned must be operational and under normal load to effectively highlight problem areas.

What makes thermography so useful?

There are 3 things that make infrared thermal imaging especially useful:

• It is non-contact and uses remote sensing – Thermography does not affect the target or intrude upon it in any way.
• It is two dimensional – Comparisons between areas on the target are possible: we can measure at two points or a hundred points in the same image, and then compare them.
• It is in real time – Immediate action is possible as real time imaging allows for fast scanning of stationary targets.

FLIR T640 and Fluke TiR32 infrared cameras are used to take an infrared photograph to clearly show where problems exist.

This results in: –

• Cost savings
• Early detection of potential faults
• No unplanned maintenance
• No unplanned downtime