Following pump replacement, vibration data showed significant improvement, confirming a prior developing issue. Inspection of the removed pump revealed severe bearing wear and pitting, validating the condition detected in the data.
The CME recommended replacing the pump bearings and rotating the motor by hand during repair to check for any signs of motor bearing roughness.
The pump was replaced, resulting in immediate improvement in vibration levels. Early detection and action prevented a potential catastrophic failure. If the pump had failed unexpectedly, it would have caused a full production shutdown. With a 14-week replacement lead time and continuous operation, this equated to 2,352 hours of potential downtime. Using conservative production estimates, the total potential impact was calculated at approximately $5.8M. After applying conservative adjustments, the avoided impact was estimated at approximately $1.6M and 784 hours of unplanned downtime.
