62 MARCH 2007 TRIBOLOGY & LUBRICATION TECHNOLOGY By Jack Poley On Condition Monitoring n this month’s column, we’ll do an evaluation on a hydraulic pump test result, given the following infor- mation about this component: • Equipment type: Molding Machine • Equipment manufacturer: EasyMold • Equipment model: 13 • Component type: Hydraulic Pump – Sub-type: Vane • Component manufacturer: not provided • Component model: not provided • Application: Injection Molding • Lube manufacturer: A-1 Lubes • Lube brand: HydroLube • Grade: ISO 46 • Filter type: Full-Flow • Filter manufacturer: FilterWell • Filter brand: HydroFilter • Filter rating (nominal): ? • Sump capacity: 9 gallons While the above information is standard when a com- ponent is placed into a testing program, often information is missing such as the component manufacturer/model above. Items in bold are the most important information to have. Let’s first review the purpose, importance and hierarchy of some of these fields for which we’d prefer to have information: Equipment type. The overall machine or installation; examples: • On-Road: truck, tractor, rig. • Off-Road: scraper tractor, haul truck, crusher, dragline. • Oil & Gas: drilling rig/platform, pipeline station. • Industrial: manufacturing plant no. 4, power plant, mill. • Marine: tugboat, container ship, cruise ship. Equipment manufacturer/model. It’s not always easy to know the component manufacturer of the sump from which the sample came, sometimes because the compo- nent is private labeled. Occasionally in such instances the equipment manufacturer can be substituted as a help because many OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) use single-source suppliers for their componentry, creat- ing a form of ‘standardization’ within the test data. Knowl- edge of the equipment model also may help ‘age’ the machine, i.e., allow the evaluator to know the age of the component from which the sample came. Component type: no component type, no evaluation. It should be crystal clear that not knowing from whence the sam- ple emanated, one has no business trying to evaluate it. Neverthe- less, liberties are taken almost daily in large volume com- mercial labs but with a high degree of insurance built in, e.g., a long-time customer has 100-plus components on a program, all of which are diesel engines (various mix of manufacturers). A new unit is put into play and its engine is sampled and sent to the lab. The person logging in the sample makes the reasonable assumption that this new component is, like all the others, a diesel engine, but can- not identify its manufacturer, let alone the model. Further, he sees the sample is pitch black, confirming his assump- tion that it’s (probably) a diesel engine. This is OK, pro- vided one chases down the missing information and veri- fies the initial assumption sooner rather than later. Better is for the end-user to do right the first time and get in the habit of providing full information at the outset of a program and with each addition, change or substitu- tion of a component thereafter. Here are examples of com- ponent types: • Hydraulic Pump (generic) ■ Vane (specific) ■ Axial Piston ■ Gear • Gearbox (generic) ■ Gearbox, Hypoid gear set (specific) • Reciprocating Engine (lots of engines reciprocate!) ■ Diesel (big, little, using no. 2 fuel or no. 6 fuel?, air-cooled or water-cooled?) ■ Steam • Transmission, Manual (or Automatic or Powershift type?) I Evaluating a hydraulic pump test