Experience shows that around half of all premature bearing failures are due to inadequate lubrication and contaminated lubricants. The failure of individual bearings can be really expensive if it brings the entire production to a standstill. "And this is all the more annoying when you know that lubricants usually only account for one to three percent of total maintenance and repair costs," says lubrication expert Jens Beck from Technology Business Management at SKF in Schweinfurt.

Jens Beck, lubrication specialist at SKF in Schweinfurt © SKF

However, as Beck has often experienced, many factories are downright adventurous in their handling of the material that is supposed to result in the smoothest possible production: You can find greases well past their expiry date, completely incorrectly stored lubrication supplies or heavily contaminated oils. "If you like, lubrication media and technologies are often in a state similar to that of the first industrial revolution," reports the STLE and ICML-certified and listed lubrication specialist with a wink. "Yet there are now plenty of ways to make the lubrication sector fit for the Industry 4.0 era."

Analyze the current situation

Experience has shown that around 50 percent of premature bearing failures are due to improper lubrication and contamination. © SKF

As you would expect, the first step is to collect data. To do this, the SKF experts use a structured questionnaire to record the current status of the customer's lubrication management - they create a customer needs analysis. From this, existing strengths and, of course, initial optimization potential can be derived. The top priority here is to deliver the right lubricant in the right quantity to the right place at the right time using the right lubrication process.

With this goal in mind, the focus is now shifting to the existing infrastructure: the "Lubrication Audit" is a detailed as-is analysis of all relevant lubrication, application and machine component conditions. "This is important so that the individual conditions on site can be reflected in their respective ideal states," emphasizes Beck.

This comparison is so important, for example, because it is quite easy to get used to certain bearing life cycles in day-to-day operations and therefore consider them normal at some point. This often turns out to be a mistake: "We find time and again that the service life can sometimes be drastically extended by using ideal lubricants and techniques."

From over 25 years of experience in lubrication technology, Beck cites improper handling of oils as a typical example of carelessness when dealing with lubricants: "Anyone who literally leaves their drums out in the rain or uses one and the same container for different oils will sooner or later damage the lubricant. This naturally impairs the performance of the oil so that it can no longer fulfill its actual task - namely to ensure maximum service life of the machine components."