Steel Mill Avoids Compromised Emissions Levels and Millions of Dollars in Downtime
Problem:
A hot strip mini mill faced millions of dollars in lost production and compromised environmental emissions levels when it unknowingly put a defective baghouse fan motor into service.
Solution:
Without having to send an analyst on-site, Azima was able to detect a bearing fault in the motor remotely, and to notice an increase in degradation immediately after a mill worker performed incorrect lubrication. The mill was able to swap out the baghouse fan with a spare one without any impact on production.
Result:
The mill avoided a $500,000 per day production loss and was able to keep its environmental emissions within legally permitted limits.
The Story:
A hot strip mini mill replaced an ailing motor in one of its baghouse fans with a reconditioned one. Though the fan appeared to be running fine after the replacement, Azima's remote monitoring and diagnostic system immediately detected a problem at start up.
"The vibration levels were just too high," said Azima Director Don Rainey. "Our remote monitoring system sent an automated alert and an initial look at the spectral data indicated a problem with the IB motor bearing."
Using Azima's web-based diagnostic tools, Mr. Rainey — who was 300 miles away and armed with just a laptop — performed a more detailed analysis and determined that there was an outer race fault on the motor inboard bearing.
The defect was not severe enough to force an immediate shut down. Mr. Rainey was confident that, at the current rate of degradation, the fan would make it to a scheduled outage a few weeks away.
However, just two days later, the situation changed when a mill maintenance worker mistakenly added specialty grease to the motor. Within hours, Azima's monitoring system detected an accelerated degradation of the bearing.
Azima's Mr. Rainey immediately contacted the environmental manager.
"The vibration levels were climbing very quickly," Mr. Rainey said. "It was clear that, at this rate, the motor was not going to last much longer."
After discussions with Azima, the mill decided to swap out the baghouse fan with a spare one.
"We just couldn't risk a failure. If that baghouse fan went out of service, our production would be severely impacted to the tune of a half a million dollars a day," the environmental manager said. "Plus, we wouldn't be able to keep our emissions within the limits of our permit."
To avoid a repeat of the problem, Azima remotely monitored the spare fan for a short period prior to it being put into service to ensure it was in good working condition.
The swap was made without any impact on production.
"Azima's remote monitoring system alerted us to a problem that could have cost us millions," the environmental manager said. "Their system is web-based, so Azima's analyst never had to come to the mill. He was able to view our data and diagnose the problem over the Internet, right from his laptop. Time was of the essence, so that was a huge benefit for us." |
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