Monitor Biodiesel “Shelf Life” – Test for Bacteria, Fungi and Mold


The use of biodiesel and biodiesel blends is continuing to become more prevalent in the marketplace. Implementation is easy because the fuels work with existing fuel systems with little to no effect on performance.

Yet biodiesel fuels are not without problems. They are prone to biological growth and may need special treatment for optimum cold weather performance. Regular testing can help find issues early before they develop and plug fuel filters.

Biodiesel and biodiesel blends are a natural food source for biological growth. Water contamination is a concern for any fuel because, along with corroding the storage tank, water also aids in microbial growth. Testing fuel regularly for bacteria, fungi, and mold, as well as monitoring water content, is recommended to know when treatment is needed.

Testing becomes even more critical as we approach the cooler winter months. Winter temperatures could dip below your fuel’s cloud and pour points which causes filter-plugging wax crystals to form. Biodiesel and biodiesel blends naturally have a higher pour point than #1 and #2 diesel fuel, meaning that they could present cold weather problems sooner. Thankfully, additives are available that can lower cloud point and pour points if a problem is identified.

POLARIS Laboratories® recommends testing bulk fuel tanks every three months to stay on top of filter plugging problems. Regular testing will help you know when to treat your fuel before problems can escalate.

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Overcooling Is as Detrimental as Overheating


It’s common for maintenance personnel watch for conditions that can cause overheating in their engines. Did you know that overcooling causes just as much damage to an engine as overheating?

Overcooling most commonly occurs when the coolant bypasses a defective water temperature regulator and flows directly to the radiator preventing the engine from reaching normal operating temperature. Your coolant system is a vital one – but typically the most neglected and least understood.

How-To-Prevent-Your-Engine-From-OvercoolingOur Data Analysis Team at POLARIS Laboratories® has identified just four tasks to add to your routine maintenance to help prevent overcooling and ensure the health of your coolant system.

Learn more about getting a coolant analysis program started with POLARIS Laboratories®.

 

 

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How Clean Is Your Fuel?


Many people assume they’re buying quality fuel that meets the required specifications, so diesel fuel cleanliness is seldom questioned. However, fuel systems with higher operating pressures have lower system tolerances for contamination and require very tight filtration. These factors have pushed fuel cleanliness into the maintenance spotlight.

Fuel system pumps and injectors are most susceptible to contamination from micro-organisms, asphaltines, dirt, sediment and rust. These particulates will quickly clog fuel filters, erode injectors, cause valves to stick and damage or clog injector spray nozzles. This can lead to overfueling, inefficient combustion and piston wear.

How can you extend your fuel filter life and maximize injector performance?
Simple. Identify both the size and concentration of contaminant particles in your bulk diesel fuel supply and filter out unwanted contaminants.

How can you identify the size and concentration?
Perform an ISO Particle Count test on all of your fuel samples. An optical laser will count and report the number of particles present in each of eight micron ranges (spanning from 4 micron to 100 microns). An ISO Cleanliness Code is then assigned based on the number of particles present at the 4, 6 and 14 micron levels.

Chart-Your-Diesel-Fuel-CleanlinessEngine manufacturers are realizing diesel fuel cleanliness can have great impact on overall engine performance. In fact, many are now recommending diesel fuel that does not meet an ISO Cleanliness Code of 18/16/13 should be filtered before introduction to the fuel system. Surprisingly, more than 50 percent of samples tested by POLARIS Laboratories® do not meet the OEM’s 18/16/13 ISO Cleanliness Code recommendations. By these numbers, half of the diesel fuel in your bulk storage should be filtered before adding it to an engine’s fuel tank. Now, do you know how clean your fuel is?

 

 

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Q&A with Keynote Speaker David Cripps

Cripps-Head-ShotThe 2015 POLARIS Laboratories Customer Summit has an amazing lineup of speakers to demonstrate how oil analysis helps drive
action inside their maintenance programs.

Likewise, keynote speaker David Cripps, chief engineer for HERTA Racing, will bring a unique perspective to the summit. POLARIS Laboratories® sat down with Mr. Cripps for a preview of what’s in store for Customer Summit attendees.

 

POLARIS Laboratories: At what moment did you realize the money- and equipment-saving potential of oil analysis?

David Cripps: In racing, the key performance area we’re concerned with is drag, and there’s a tremendous amount of drag within the mechanical components. Lots of R&D goes into finding bearings and coatings that minimize the drag. Mostly, it’s accomplished by lowering lubricant viscosity as much as possible without lowering the life of the equipment. Oil analysis is an important piece of the process – especially when evaluating the wear on the equipment.

PL: What is the one piece of advice you wish every oil analysis user would follow?

DC: Data is king. It’s extremely important. People will acquire loads of data thinking they’ve done their job. But data processing is what’s important. You need a data reduction process – to collate it. You need to paint longer-term pictures, to refine the data.

PL: What’s the best oil analysis “save” you have experienced?

DC: That’s actually a story I’m going to talk about during the Customer Summit. I don’t want to give too much away, but I’ll give you a quick preview: Assume nothing.

PL: How did you end up coming to Indianapolis, and what do you think of the city?

DC: [Former IndyCar driver] Dick Simon personally invited me to work for him in Indy. He was a great guy and he had a growing racing team. That’s when I began laying down roots in the city. 20 years later, Indianapolis has changed a lot. It’s an impressive, well-run city. The downtown went through a huge renovation, and now it’s a clean, attractive place people want to hold events at, like this summit. The city is more than just racing – there’s a good cross-section of business with a little bit of everything.

Hear more from David Cripps during the 2015 POLARIS Laboratories Customer Summit. Register for the summit before July 16 and save $200. 

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Let us prove it to you. 

Published July 6, 2015

Take HORIZON Wherever You Go with the Mobile App

I am thrilled to unveil the newest installment of our award-winning fluid analysis software – the HORIZON® mobile app. After months of hard work and behind-the-scenes configuration, the HORIZON app and web versions sync in real-time, regardless of whether you’re on a smartphone, tablet or computer.

The feature most customers are looking forward to is adjustable alerts for the app. The app will send a “push” notification to your phone when a sample arrives, and, yes, you can adjust the alerts based on fluid type and overall severity. Since our labs process samples around the clock, I recommend using the “Do Not Disturb” feature during off hours.   

For now, the app is only available for Apple devices running iOS 8 or higher. We anticipate the release of the app for Android devices in 2016. In the meantime, anyone can still access HORIZON on a standard mobile web browser.

The next feature we are developing is submitting sample information via the mobile app. We improved the web-based sample submission process earlier this year, and this app will be able to perform those same tasks this fall. You will be able to stand next to the equipment and enter fluid time, mileage and other information directly into HORIZON, which will completely eliminate handwritten paperwork and a lot of errors along with it.

Proven Impact. Proven Uptime. Proven Savings.
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Published June 30, 2016

Online Sample Submission: Change Is Good

Submitting sample information through HORIZON® is quick, easy and, best of all, reduces errors. While this option has been available, we’ve redesigned the feature to be better than ever.

But why does this matter to you today? Several reasons.

The redesign also gave us the opportunity to prepare HORIZON for future updates. The HORIZON mobile app is coming out Summer 2015, and a lot of behind-the-scenes work was needed to set the foundation for the mobile app. You will be able to view and filter sample reports when the app is first released, and soon after you’ll be able to submit sample information from your mobile device, too.

After selecting the components that were sampled, now the information and fluid type is displayed right next to the sample fields. The system will make sure the barcode you enter is valid to use on the component type. This should reduce the number of coolants submitted as oils and vice versa.

You also can collapse the fields for each component or even remove components from the screen. Collapsing large lists of components and expanding the fields only when needed greatly reduces the amount of scrolling required. Removing individual components was a popular request because if the wrong component was selected in the old sample submission process, users had to move back a screen, unselect the component and re-enter all of the sample data.

Just after the new sample submission process launched, we received a call from a customer with immediate feedback. He had pulled many samples and wanted to save time by submitting the sample information online. The customer processed half of them in about five hours before work ended. The next morning, he noticed the new sample submission feature had deployed. The customer picked up where he left off with the samples, and to his surprise, the last half of the samples only took him two hours! He was very impressed by the improvements and appreciated the additional time we saved him.

For instructions on using the new sample submission process, download the written instructions or watch the video.

Proven Impact. Proven Uptime. Proven Savings.
Let us prove it to you. 

Published June 9, 2015

Condition-Based Maintenance


Preventative maintenance only occurs when a set intervals of time or usage passes. This leaves equipment problems unaddressed for long periods, which leads to unexpected failures.

True condition-based maintenance programs perform equipment maintenance only when condition-monitoring technologies provide sufficient evidence that the condition of the fluid and/or the equipment merits action. Then maintenance can be scheduled to minimize any disruption to the equipment’s uptime, but it is necessary for technology to prove there is a problem and establish a clear direction for correcting it.

EXAMPLE 1: Diesel engine re-builds are typically done at around 750,000 miles with oil drain intervals around 10,000 miles. Unexpected issues can reduce that interval, including fuel scheduling issues (bad injectors, excessive soot) or coolant contamination (leaks in the engine or the EGR cooler). This creates wear and leads to premature failure. Normal scheduled maintenance every 25,000 miles will spot these issues, but this leads to unscheduled downtime as the unit waits for parts. In the worst-case scenario, a problem develops and causes a failure before the next scheduled maintenance, causing collateral damage to other components.

EXAMPLE 2: A typical diesel engine can use a condition-based maintenance strategy and rely on oil analysis trends to optimize drain intervals. When wear, contamination and/or fluid degradation approaches levels that could result in engine damage, the data analysis will recommend to change the oil, resample to verify the result or perform additional diagnostics. This allows parts to be staged for the unit so there is no delay when maintenance is performed. All of this increases the unit’s uptime and can even delay a rebuild.

Benefits of Condition-Based Maintenance

  • Operating costs are significantly reduced.
  • Extending maintenance and oil drain intervals reduces wrench time and oil consumption.
  • Performing the appropriate maintenance on the appropriate unit at the appropriate time increases component life and improves overall fleet management.
  • Trending data provides early knowledge of possible failures, allows for scheduled maintenance and drastically reduces unscheduled downtime. This requires changing from a preventive maintenance strategy to a predictive maintenance strategy that identifies and addresses small problems before they develop into catastrophic failures.
  • Regularly reviewing trends of condition monitoring results provides more accurate root-cause analysis of preventable failures.

Condition-Based-Maintenance-TimelineNeed a plan to move your program from interval-based to condition-based maintenance today?
Take a look at our simple 8-week timeline.

Learn more about getting an oil analysis program started with POLARIS Laboratories®.

 

Proven Impact. Proven Uptime. Proven Savings.
Let us prove it to you. 

Published June 9, 2015

Advancing Fluid Analysis with Data


Recently, POLARIS Laboratories® changed how we apply flagging limits to our particle quantifier (PQ) test results. Changes to flagging limits happen fairly regularly as we get new information and reach new data accumulation milestones. The change to the PQ is noteworthy for several reasons, but first let me explain a little more about the test.

PQ is a relatively new test in the oil analysis industry, so there isn’t a lot of historical data to examine. Also, unlike most other oil analysis tests, the results are an “index” with no unit of measurement (like microns or millimeters). Flagging limits are set on the index, and our data analysts compare the test results to the flagging limits to determine severity level and maintenance recommendations.

Until now, the flagging limits were limited to the type of component, like engine or differential. The size, configuration or application was not considered because there wasn’t enough historical data to affect the maintenance recommendations.

After offering PQ testing for several years, we have accumulated enough data to go beyond component type and make maintenance recommendations based on component manufacturer and model, like we do with the majority of our other tests. As you can imagine, contamination does not affect equipment made by different OEMs the same way, so being able to flag PQ by manufacturer and model is expected to improve the accuracy of our maintenance recommendations.

We’re proud of our flagging limits because of the time and effort that goes into this kind of data-driven analysis helps our customers identify wear early, safely extend fluid drains and save money. If you have any questions about PQ or our new flagging limits, please don’t hesitate to call (317.808.3750) or email.

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Published April 23, 2015

Testing Confirms When To Extend Recommended Drain Intervals


As engine oil manufacturers continue to develop new products designed to be stronger and last longer, some also are recommending drain intervals. Original equipment manufacturers also specify drain intervals and qualify oils for use in the equipment they sell. In both instances, it is important to recognize these recommendations may not be all inclusive of every operating condition or every application in which the oil might be used. For more information and clarification, please contact one of our data analysts.

How do you know an oil manufacturer’s recommended intervals will protect your equipment? Will the oil last as long as they say it will in your operating conditions? Could it last longer?
Yes, no or maybe! Only testing in-service fluids can answer that question. Combining the manufacturer’s specifications with laboratory results and recommendations from certified data analysts is the best way to safely optimize drain intervals, minimize wear and preserve equipment health.

What tests are needed to safely extend drain intervals?
An Advanced Mobil test package is required to safely extend drain intervals. This test package examines the three main fluid properties – base number (BN), oxidation/nitration and viscosity – that assess the oil properties responsible for protecting equipment. Tracking the values of these tests will alert you when a fluid is no longer capable of performing as expected until the next oil sample or drain.

Are there maintenance practices that will help me extend drain intervals?
When extending drains, the most important maintenance activities are to replenish depleted fluid properties, continue changing filters and monitor contamination/wear levels. If possible, replenish depleted additives or sweeten with new oil as needed. Filters are vital to capturing contaminants, so continue changing oil filters if it doesn’t require draining the sump. Finally, make sure to continue oil analysis testing at the old drain interval in order to monitor contamination levels to determine if the extended exposure to contaminants harms the equipment.

Safely-Optimize-Drain-Intervals

Learn more about tracking BN, oxidation/nitration and viscosity to ensure you’re safe.

Learn more about starting an oil analysis program with POLARIS Laboratories®.

 

 

Proven Impact. Proven Uptime. Proven Savings.
Let us prove it to you. 

Published April 7, 2015

The 2015 Customer Summit


Tailor made to address your biggest challenges

If you’ve ever had anything custom made, you know the feeling. It fits like a glove and meets your needs. It helps you get the job done—and done right. The fact is, there’s inherent value in having something made especially for you or with you in mind.

Imparting this kind of tailor-made value is our goal with the 2015 POLARIS Laboratories® Customer Summit. Sporting the theme, “Driving Action,” this summit will use both our day-to-day experience working with our customers and feedback from our customers to address the topics and challenges YOU—our customer—say are most important. Whether you’re a reseller, distributor, OEM or end user, you’ll find the information, insights and ready-to-implement strategies you need to extend equipment life, increase uptime and realize cost savings.

More detailed programming information about this exclusive, customers-only summit (October 5-7 at the Conrad Hotel in Indianapolis) is available online. For now, I’d like to share with you some of the key takeaways you can expect in October.

First, we’ve structured some of the topical sessions along three tracks—Program Management, Contamination Control and Program Execution. Within the three tracks, we’ll target common concerns, problem areas and frequently asked questions. While you’ll hear from members of our POLARIS Laboratories® team, you’ll also learn from customers just like you who are achieving success with their oil analysis programs. Customers sharing their insights, strategies and successes are what will really set this meeting apart from other conferences you might attend this year.

Here are just some of the program highlights you can expect in October:

Structuring your oil analysis program to fit your needs – Learn how to customize and follow a systematic oil analysis program that considers your organization’s strengths and weaknesses and helps meet your objectives.

Increase equipment uptime – Know and understand which oil analysis recommendations are “musts” and which ones you can schedule for a later time. Finding the right balance about when to take action will help maximize equipment uptime.

Calculate and assess your return on investment – Gain insight into how you can calculate a reliable ROI for your oil analysis program. We’ll show you how in this highly anticipated, must-attend presentation.

Move from preventive and reactive to predictive and proactive – If the 2015 Customer Summit has an overall theme, this might be it. Nearly every successful oil analysis program is more predictive and proactive than anything else. You’ll learn strategies for moving your program beyond short-term, reactive fixes to actions that are forward thinking, reducing the likelihood of equipment damage and increasing profitability.

Take a proactive step now. Register for the summit today – or at least by May 15 – and save $200.

Proven Impact. Proven Uptime. Proven Savings.
Let us prove it to you. 

Published March 10, 2015