Most maintenance teams recognize how critical proper lube management is in asset reliability. Lubrication or lube management optimizes lubricant use such that assets perform as expected at high efficiency and with maximum lifespan. Unfortunately, even with the known benefits, few maintenance teams can convince their organization’s leaders to invest in improving their lube management programs. These leaders and decision-makers often fail to see the benefits of spending money on lube management.
In this post, you will learn about the opportunities that your organization can gain from investing in an effective lube management program.
Lube Management and Asset Reliability
But first, what is lube management? Lube management, as the term suggests, is all about overseeing lubrication practices for the benefit of a company’s assets. The goal of lube management is to maintain proper lubrication for all assets.
Why is lube management essential for asset reliability? Ensuring proper lubrication means effectively minimizing friction, preventing wear, and increasing energy efficiency in assets. Assets with parts that experience less friction, are not prone to wear, and require less energy have higher reliability, i.e., they are more likely to perform as expected and least likely to break down or fail.
Lube Management Costs
When implementing or improving lube management programs and strategies, it helps to analyze the related costs. Investing in a sound lube management program is easier if there is a deep understanding of the following areas:
Costs of Current Lube Management
With improper lubrication comes issues in asset reliability that translate to costs for the company. These costs can come from asset and component replacement, labor, downtime, low product or service quality, and other opportunity losses. Calculating these costs allows maintenance teams to identify critical areas of improvement and devise programs to address them.
Costs of Improving Lube Management
Improving and updating current lube management practices requires considerable investment. These costs include high-quality lubricants, improved storage and handling, equipment upgrades, lubricant delivery systems, and lubricant monitoring methods or tests. These costs may vary according to the issue to be addressed and the specific lubrication practices in place. Streamlining and standardizing current practices can provide the greatest improvement in lube management.
Return on Investment
The return on investment justifies the investment in a company’s lube management program. Estimating your ROI means providing the cost benefits of improved lubrication practices. Depending on the issues and improvements implemented, ROI can include the costs saved on maintenance hours, downtime, inventory, and other lube management costs. Estimating the ROI on lube management requires accurate collection and thorough analysis of all the pertinent maintenance and lubrication data.
Lube Management Opportunities
Investing in proper lube management provides several cost reduction and high profitability opportunities to an organization, all of which are a result of these two direct and major benefits:
Energy Efficiency
Proper lubrication results in operational efficiency. This means that assets require less energy and resources to function. Energy cost is often the largest expense in industries that use heavy machinery and similar assets. Even a 1% reduction in energy use through proper lubrication can mean significant cost savings, thus justifying the investment in proper lube management. Furthermore, energy-efficient assets also result in low operating costs, high asset value, reduced safety-related costs, and other cost benefits.
Preventive Maintenance
Proper lubrication involves condition-based maintenance (CBM) where asset condition dictates what maintenance tasks are implemented. By implementing CBM, maintenance becomes more proactive and focused. Thus, maintenance costs can experience savings on major asset repairs, expensive part replacements, costly specialized technical labor, prolonged downtime, and productivity loss.
The Benefits of Lubrication Management Software
Lubrication Management Software like Redlist is increasingly becoming one of the most valuable business tools today. This modern tool is designed to digitize and automate lube management, providing the following benefits:
Simplified Management of Work Orders
Redlist’s digital and centralized platform allows for easier administration of work orders. Maintenance teams can create lube management tasks, prioritize tasks accordingly, and report task completion in real-time. This streamlined workflow is less prone to inaccuracies, less time-consuming, and results in more productive team members.
Data-Based Decision-Making
Digital data collection makes analysis and decision-making more accurate. Redlist empowers organizations to gain valuable lubrication insights with its powerful data analytics. It is especially valuable for facilities having numerous assets and large volumes of data. Data-driven decisions through Redlist result in lube management that has optimized efficiency and cost-effectiveness.
Alerts and Real-Time Monitoring
Digitized information through Redlist allows team members to share and respond to information faster. Real-time monitoring lets users know critical conditions that require immediate action. Redlist also allows teams to set up alerts, such as on inventory levels, pending tasks, etc. All these functionalities promote a more efficient and effective lube management program. When evaluating the cost benefits of an effective lube management program, a powerful system like Redlist is indispensable. You can use it to collect, organize, and analyze maintenance data to define the costs of implementation, savings, and ROI. To find out more about the profitability and related opportunities in using Redlist, contact our team of experts today!
