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Managing Asset Reliability in Food Production

Shawn French, director of innovation and packaging engineering at Danone North America, explains the key details of managing asset reliability in food production, like what to do when a machine fails, and how to best work with OEMs for long-term success.


Transcript

Derrick Teal: Welcome to the ProFood World video interview series. I'm editor in chief Derrick Teal.

This series explores the latest and greatest in food manufacturing by talking to industry leaders who know the ins and outs of what's important and what you need to know now in food processing operations. Whether you're here for some fresh insights or just curious about what's important for your operations, you're in the right place.

This episode is hosted by Bryan Griffen of Griffen Executive Solutions. Let's jump in.

Bryan Griffen: Thank you, Derrick, and welcome to the next episode of our ProFood World video series. I'm Bryan Griffen, a 30-year veteran of the consumer packaged goods processing and packaging industry. Having spent many years in factories, I'm quite excited about today's topic.

So, we're diving into a subject critical to keeping operations running smoothly. Namely asset reliability. Joining me is Shawn French from Danone North America, a leader in the food and beverage industry and someone with a wealth of experience in the engineering aspects and operations aspects of factories.

Shawn has a mechanical engineering degree from Iowa State University, and most of his 30-plus year career has been spent in the CPG industry. He has worked in various roles including plant maintenance and engineering, corporate engineering, packaging system design, packaging development, R&D, front-end engineering, and continuous improvement. So he has quite a resume.

He's worked in food and beverage and household cleaning sectors with companies such as Hormel Foods, Nabisco, Kraft Foods, Danone, and Sun Products Corporation. For the last eight years, Shawn has been at Danone North America, where he is currently the director of robotics, solutions, and safety.

He is also very active with PMMI, serving as the chairman of the OpX Leadership Network, and for the past two years, he is also on the advisory board for Packaging World Magazine. Shawn currently resides in Salt Lake City with his wife, Beth, and five to seven dogs, depending on the day.

Shawn, thanks for taking a break from your busy schedule to chat with us. It sounds like there's an interesting story with the dogs. Care to share?

Shawn French: Well, we somehow, we got a dog, which became a couple. And then my son moved away, so we got his dog. My daughter lives in the neighborhood, and sometimes we get her dog. So that gets me to five, and then we've got two golden retrievers that live next door, and they often come over and visit. So, it's not common, but it does happen where there's seven dogs in my house. Clearly, I like pets.

Bryan Griffen: Yeah, so I understand that completely, I have a plethora of pets in my house as well. So, congratulations on your five to seven dogs.

So, let’s dive right in. We all have those “Oh, no” moments in the factory, where a machine simply stops. You know, the kind that make you facepalm and think, “How did this happen?” Maintenance failures, they're an inevitable part of the game, but the key is what we learn from them. Can you share one of those memorable moments and the lessons that you took away?

Shawn French: I think there are a couple really difficult situations, difficult in the way of being a bit embarrassing, right? We started up a new conveyor system and the conveyors ran for a while. And then all of a sudden, a couple of them just stopped running. And when we checked them, they had no oil in the gearbox.

So how can that have happened? How can it not have been kind of a part of the installation check? And it's interesting that a motor can run, a gearbox can run for a period of time with no oil and then it fails. Sothose sorts of lessons change your behavior for future projects.

Another embarrassing moment was, there was a product conveying system. It was on a Nutter Butter cookie line, and it was taking away the Nutter Butter cookies, because you can't stop the line when the packaging stops, you need to be able to get rid of the waste. And so, it was taking away the waste cookies.

And I didn't really understand the system well enough to know how it was controlled, and I learned a lot through initial failures. So I thought it was going to be 10-horsepower motors and that's what I communicated to my electrical engineer, and turned out to be 5-horsepower motors. And for whatever reason, we never checked.

So those motors ran for about 10 minutes, and then I burned up $10,000 to $15,000 worth of conveyor motors. Again, it's sort of that, you think this is what it is and you share that with other engineering disciplines that do their design, but you always have to go back and check.

And so those are a little bit of maintenance, but also a bit of engineering and project management and communication. One of my great interview questions is, “Tell me about a time that something failed, or you really screwed up.” And that and that candidate that says, “Gee, Shawn, I've never really had that sort of experience.” You know, I can call BS on that, but clearly, you've never done anything or done anything difficult that you've not had a failure.

Because, I'm sure you have, and everybody on this call, has a laundry list of things that they really just screwed up. And it's not so much that you made a mistake, it's really what you took away from it, and how it changed how you worked or how you communicated with the factory, the mechanics, the equipment vendor, that you learned from that failure.

Bryan Griffen: Absolutely. That's some great insight, Shawn. So, let's look at the people closest to the action, the folks who live and breathe this equipment every day, namely the operators. They're like the pit crew in a Formula 1 race. Their actions can either keep things running smoothly or throw a wrench into the works, sometimes literally.

So, in your experience, how can operators impact reliability, both positively and negatively, and maybe share a story about one of those infamous metric crescent wrench moments?

Shawn French: So, you look at sources of information, and is there a better source than the guy or gal that's standing next to a machine for 12 hours a day?

And how often do we go out on a line and we fail to ask that person that probably knows the most what they hear or what they see or what they think? And it's not important that they have the exact answer, but they may have a clue, of “It was running fine, and then I started to hear something or smell something, or it just, it wasn't doing what it normally did, and it was over here in this part of the machine.”

Maybe that's where it's happening, or maybe it's somewhere else, but I think you develop better relationships and you get more engagement when you ask the people that are closest to the machine, “What's going on?”

You know, clearly a machine that's clean is going to run better, to a point… I was in a milk dairy. One of our plants was making organic milk and the operator very proudly showed me how the milk, the machine didn't smell of stale milk because he did an amazing job of cleaning it. But he was cleaning it so much that the frame was falling apart.

So you can take it to the other extreme, right? How many times have you been on the line and the operators aren't supposed to have tools, but they all have a, as I call it, a metric crescent wrench, right? They all have a wrench to where they can make little adjustments.

And I think back to early in my career when my buddy, the controls engineer, got tired of people making adjustments that weren't helping the line run better. So he actually put a button or a dial on the control panel and he pulled some people aside and said, “I've got all your settings here. You just move that to selector A.” And he went to the guys on the other shift, and said, “Don't tell anybody, but move it to selector B.” And that button, that switch was connected to nothing. But people's belief that the way they like to run the machine was already incorporated, made a difference. It helped the shifts run better because people felt like, "They understand what I need for this machine to run properly.”

Bryan Griffen: Absolutely. I've actually seen that exact same scenario in a factory that I was in. A dead-end switch that each shift was just absolutely convinced it had to be set their way.

Shawn French: I think, people like to make adjustments. And if a machine is very forgiving, it allows you to make adjustments to the point where you don't know where you started.

I've seen that where we were adjusting for bad materials instead of just getting different materials, then you got good materials, but you had adjusted away from your center line. And now you weren't exactly sure where the center line was. And so I think there's always a risk when you do too many adjustments to accommodate for situations.

Bryan Griffen: Yeah, you lose that gold standard of where we should be operating.

So, let's shift gears a little bit. While the operators are key, we all know that there's a lot of groundwork for maintenance that's laid before the equipment ever even hits the floor. Before the machine comes into the factory, there should already have been some maintenance taken into consideration.

So, what role does the OEM play in improving maintenance and maintainability for the equipment that they provide?

Shawn French: One thing that can be done is to understand that if you have a machine that's got five different motors, do they really all have to be different? Or can you have them, some of them slightly oversized that you only end up with one motor or one gearbox that has to be stocked.

Can you maybe understand that your standard and my standard are different, and I have certain motor I like or automation vendor I like or pneumatic vendor. It's a lot easier if you adjust to my standard, than if I have to adjust to yours. Because every OEM has their own standard. So then then it's harder and there's a bit of respect of the mechanics that I share when I'm able to get standard, you know, we agree to a standard componentry and I'm able to bring machines that have those already built in with them.

Wherever we can standardize is better. If I can put in an automatic lubrication system, that's better than a bank of grease zerks. It's better to have them clustered together than having them at random points on the machine. You know, I have a better chance that I'm going to get the right lubrication done.

If those zerks also have rings on them that tell me, “Grease this every eight hours and grease this once a week.” So, you know, I'm trying to do those sorts of things that add first cost to the machine, but the overall lifetime cost, the total cost of ownership ends up being lower because I've taken those things into account.

If I have to do something for a changeover, are those change parts really heavy, or is there a way to make them lighter? Have I engraved them or color-coded them so that when you're running a 20-ounce bottle, every machine that's running the 20-ounce bottle, the change parts are the same color?

So, those sorts of things help simplify the work of the operators and the mechanics. Are there areas that are hard to clean, hard to access? Or are really, you know, creating a difficulty to reach in and do a task that needs to be done? So, as an engineer, I can put on my mechanics hat as we look at the machine, as we review drawings, as we do pre activities and activities, so we really are taking into account things that can make the total life of that machine better for the people that have to be around it every day.

Bryan Griffen: Okay, yeah, that makes some sense. So based on your experience, what's one thing that the OEMs are doing right? And what's one area where they can maybe do a little bit better, if you were to give just one piece of advice to them?

Shawn French: What I've started to see, and it's similar to the manual for your car, of, “This is the maintenance you do at 5,000 miles and 10,000 miles.” And it's very descriptive. It's very prescribed. You go to the dealer and they do the work that they're supposed to do. I've seen some vendors that are taking that same approach to a machine.

So if you say, you know, one shift, 52 weeks is 2,000 hours, right? One year's worth running around the clock is 6,000 hours. If there's a 3,000-hour maintenance and a 6,000-hour maintenance, where you as the vendor have a very defined series of work that has to be done, if you send a kit of parts and you send the people to do the work, and at 3,000 hours, we do that. And at 6,000 hours, we do the 3,000 plus another tranche of work and so on and so forth. I think that, yes, it's more money, but it probably translates into more uptime, less unplanned stops or catastrophic failures. And you're acknowledging, I'm acknowledging that my people don't know the machine in the beginning, so I'm bringing in the expertise with the right parts. And you're going to help us and teach us and we're going to do it with you. And maybe over two or three or four years, we're going to start doing it ourselves, but you're helping us start off on the right foot. And, and it's very organized and it takes some of the guesswork out of it, because you put the thought into it and you're helping us be better. That's one thing they're doing well.

The thing that's an opportunity, and it's a hard conversation is, if I go to an OEM and I want a one-inch pillow block bearing because that's part of the machine, and I can go buy that from Dodge and it's, you know, part number XYZ, right? I don't want to go to the OEM and have them hide what that part number is because they want to sell me a 1-inch pillow block bearing.

I'd rather some transparency. Yes, there's going to be specific parts that are custom designed by the OEM. I can't go buy those from my local power transmission supplier. But there's an awful lot that I can, and as a as a multi-billion-dollar company, we have you know millions of dollars in spare parts in storerooms And it's redundant from plant to plant to plant, right?

You know, if I have a CompactLogix PLC, I don't need 5 of those in every plant if I can understand exactly what it is, because the vendor shares that with me. So, as much transparency in the spare parts list as possible is appreciated.

The other thing that's been that's been a challenge is when I get the spare parts list. I have a vendor that, that we've had some hard conversations at the end of the year that said, “We will issue the spare parts list when the machine is at the port, ready to get on the boat.” And I said, “You knew what the design was months ago, and I could have ordered the parts months ago so that when the machine actually shows up, we have all the parts we need to be successful in the beginning, because we know some things are going to fail.”

That’s just not how they do it. So if I was the king, I would want a spare parts list two to three months before the FAT, which gives us enough time to get internal alignment to buy the parts, place the orders, and then have the things delivered in advance of the machine showing up on site. Because, just because you gave me a list, very few companies will just go buy everything on the list because it's too expensive.

So, there's some amount of internal review we need to do saying, “Do we already have these components? Do we have another plant? How critical are they?” And that could take, that could take a month to two months. So even though you've supplied it in advance, it takes us a while to get organized and actually get things on order.

And there's nothing like when you're on a new line startup and a machine is broke down and the plant director comes by, or the vice president of manufacturing comes by and they have no understanding why you don't have the parts.

Bryan Griffen: Yeah, that's always the question is, “Why didn't you foresee this?”

So that's some really solid advice for the and that leads right into the next piece that I wanted to talk about. That's the project engineers, you know, the folks who are often the bridge between the machine builder and the machine operators out on the plant floor, as well as the maintenance crew.

So, you've talked about a few things that they can do to ensure reliability. And I see these guys as the, the project engineers, as the architects of reliability. I mean, it's really, it's their job to make sure that the reliability is carried from the OEM all the way through the operations. So what are some of the best practices, beyond the spare parts list and the FATs, the project engineers can follow to ensure that the equipment is reliable and easy to maintain?

Shawn French: I'm a big believer in paper. So, you have a machine that needs to do something, so take the time to write an equipment specification or a needs document and be as descriptive as you can of the environment the machine will be in, the product, the packaging materials, what it's doing, what you needed to do today, what it might need to do in the future, how it's going to be operated, kind of the level of technology you can expect. If you have a standard electrical component, pneumatic component, mechanical component list, provide that to the vendor, provide them as much information as possible to define what it is you're expecting.

If you're going to run a factory acceptance test, have some words in there about that. If you're going to hold them to performance guarantee or a performance expectation, what that is, and how you will test that. And how you want to communicate throughout the project. So I think, for me, it starts with that sort of document that the vendor, the OEM then responds with a proposal.

I encourage people to avoid letting the dollars drive the decisions. Because often the small dollars or the adders here and there feel like they're expensive. But if it's really what you want, and it helps drive standardization, then it becomes less important over time. And I also believe that the first time you do a project with a vendor, it's going to have some difficulties and you're both going to learn. So, you've gone through that, you've had the pain, and now there's an opportunity to learn from that on the next machine and the next machine.

It's also, it's respectful to the operators, to the mechanics, that you're not out there finding the lowest cost machine. And now they have 18 different case packers instead of two, right? Because everyone requires learning and training and parts and is different. Versus if you standardize on machines, maybe there's an opportunity that it becomes simpler for the operators and for the mechanics.

I'm a big believer that you need to involve somebody from maintenance and somebody from operations as well as, I'm more of a mechanical person, but I have some very strong electrical and automation people, that I let them participate in the documents that I generate, and I actively have them participate in review meetings. We don't always get what we want, but we're making thoughtful decisions on what we can live with and what we can't.

In the end, I'm not, again, standing in the plant with a machine that is exactly what Shawn wants. But it's what a variety of people had input into because that machine will live long after I'm on this project.

I think for people that have never written an equipment specification, you know, as part of the OpX team, OpX leadership network, we’ve developed some really good work products on a request for proposal, on a factory acceptance test, a site acceptance test. If you've never done it, there are really good documents that a lot of folks with a lot of expertise, hundreds and hundreds of years of expertise contributed to putting these things together. And I encourage people, project engineers, folks new or old in their career, to use these documents.

But I also encourage the OEMs to suggest to their potential customers, “Hey, this project would probably go better if you spent some time and you put what you need on paper.” Because there's nothing like getting to an FAT, and somebody saying, “I didn't know it would look like that,” or “I didn't know you also needed to run that.” Well, yeah, we mentioned it at the end of the meeting 16 weeks ago. “Oh, but you never really documented it well.”

So, I think paper helps and I've found that it's not always easy to write a specification, but it makes me think of the project differently. It causes me to consider, “well, if the upstream machine stops, how does this machine react? Or the downstream machine does something else? Or what might it do two years from now that I hadn't really thought about?”

So then I have different conversations internally. “Oh, we might run a thinner material or we might want to do a different pack format.” And often those things are easier, not necessarily to buy the change parts, but to design the structure that can accommodate them later.

Bryan Griffen: Very good. That makes a lot of sense, and that's some really sound advice. So, before we wrap this up, I want to do one thing. You mentioned the OpX leadership network’s documents and tools that are available. I think that's a great resource for people, so I just want to give a shout out on the website for that.

Those documents are free for anyone to download and use. And they can be found at the website www.opxleadershipnetwork.org. OpX is OpX, so that's opxleadershipnetwork.org. That's all one word. And there's about 20 documents there that you can download and use for free that, as Shawn said, have been put together with thousands of hours of real world experience.

So Shawn, I thank you for the time that you've given us. This has been some fantastic stuff with a lot of good, actionable takeaways. Thank you for joining and sharing your experience. For our audience, thank you for joining us today. We hope you enjoyed this chat with Shawn French and picked up some useful tips on managing asset reliability.

Remember to stay tuned for our next video in the series and visit ProFood World's website for more insights. Thanks for watching.

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