The voting poll will remain open through 5 p.m. on June 19, 2009. Only one vote per EC&M subscriber, please. Any votes received from manufacturers, PR firms, or non-EC&M readers will be discarded.


Maintenance
Motors and "Worst Practices"
You’ve probably heard of "best practices." The idea is to look at what others have done and apply a similar practice to improve your situation. The flipside is "worst practices." We can look at what others have done wrong and avoid similar practices.

Visit EC&M's Web site to see some examples of worst practices.

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Electrical Troubleshooting Quiz
The plant air system depends on four 100-hp motors, and one of them is vibrating badly. The pipe coming off the compressor even makes a rattling sound. What should you not do to solve this problem? What steps should you take?

Visit EC&M's Web site to see the answer.


Motor Repairs and Failure Analysis,
Part 1
One common view of motor repair goes as follows:

1. Repair or replace motor.
2. Return to service.

This often results in a third step: repeat. If you have déjà vu with any of your motor repairs, the underlying problem is that your repair isn’t complete. You’re fixing the symptom (motor stopped, production down), not the problem.

Failure analysis allows you to determine why motors failed so you can solve for that cause. Several failure analysis methodologies exist.

To read more on this story, visit EC&M's Web site.

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Operation
NEC in the Facility
How can you make an intrinsically safe system unsafe? Ground it.

If you’ve just done a double-take on that, read the Art. 100 definitions of grounding and bonding.

To keep these systems safe, remove the difference of potential (and thus a flashover danger) from them and the metal objects around them. To do this:

1. Connect intrinsically safe apparatus, enclosures, and raceways (if metallic) to the equipment grounding (bonding) conductor [504.50].
2. Bond all metallic objects of the system per 250.100 [504.60].

Safety
In the typical modern factory, signs are everywhere. While the intention is good, the effect can be counterproductive. People get "sign fatigue" and start tuning out the flood of messages. In some facilities, there are so many signs overhead, on the walls, and on equipment that they blend into each other and ratchet up the background noise.

To read more on this story, visit EC&M's Web site.