Lubricant care may cut food and drink processors' costs

The company, which has a partnership with Shell UK Oil Products for the supply of lubricants and grease, has announced that a free publication providing information to the manufacturing industry on avoiding production downtime is available on its website.

Boccard said that a lack of care towards lubrication maintenance is costing UK businesses a significant sum each year.

According to the company’s whitepaper, UK industry spent £8bn in 2004 maintaining production machinery, and it said £1.5bn of this amount could have been saving by improving lubricant systems.

The company claims that all too often fluid management is not given the attention it deserves until a breakdown impacts on production.

Best practice​

Geoff Stewart, managing director at Boccard, told FoodProductionDaily.com that the company provides a complete lubrication planning system for food and drink manufacturers who want to ensure efficiencies, maximize their competitive advantage and raise their environmental profile:

“We have extensive experience in the provision of fluid management services and are keen to promote best practice across the food and drinks sector," ​said Stewart.

“Our planning system involves capturing all the plant’s assets, determining which oil and greases are required for a particular plant’s processing requirements, scoping the work and evaluating how to drive down costs,”​ he said.

Stewart claims that as part of its complete lubrication service, the company can detect specific machine leaks and maintenance issues, identify trends across comparable machine types, and identify issues which impinge on fluid management as well as analyse waste streams.

Techniques ​

He explained that the company employs techniques such as ultrasound and thermograph testing to analyse the performance of a bearing on a piece of equipment or a roller on a conveyor belt.

“The use of an ultrasound testing system enables us to scan all the rollers in a conveyor belt and identify the ones that are not performing correctly, without having to remove any of the end caps, which significantly reduces conveyor maintenance costs for the manufacturer involved,”​ said Stewart.

He said that the thermograph approach works in a similar way to a large digital camera, and provides a profile of the heat areas inside a bearing, allowing for detection of bearings that will need replacement in a number of months.

“This information gives processors advance notice of maintenance requirements and enables them to plan more effectively for potential shutdowns,”​ claims Stewart.

Green profile​

He added that together with its lubrication maintenance service, the company can also reduce a manufacturer’s environmental footprint though the provision of filtration equipment that reclaims excess water from the oil or recycles waste oil.

Stewart said that Boccard has an alliance with Lubetech in order to also provide their manufacturing customer base with lubrication spillage mats that are 100 per cent recyclable, while the oils and lubricants it provides come in sealed, contamination proof containers, which are colour coded to ensure safety.

He claims the company’s partnership with Shell means it receives products at a fixed discount rate; however, Stewart said that alliance would not prevent Boccard from providing neutral advise to food and beverage manufacturers on which is the most cost effective lubricant on the market for a specific process.

The company said that food manufacturers in the UK and throughout Europe can avail of its service, with McCain, Heinz, In Bev and Anheuser Bush already signed, according to Stewart.