Download - Royal Australian Navy

6 NAVY ENGINEERING BULLETIN SEPTEMBER 2003
Letters to the Editor
EDITOR NEB
Hullo,
My name is Bill Amor and in the
past I worked as a TO3 at
MMES 1, and I'd like to comment
re a statement made at the
Orange Overalls 2 in particular
WRT gauge maintenance ie in situ
maintenance.
Whilst at MMES I investigated the
in place/situ/on board
maintenance of gauges and
found the following:
a. it is cost effective after
an A&A 3 is
accomplished,
b. there are equipment's
available to do this task
ie on board calibration of
Bowden tube pressure
gauges, certain electronic
gauges and temperature
gauges, and
c. the test results are downloadable
into a computer
therefore the gauge
testing is able to be done
to Quality Standards.
Decisions to be Made
When writing a TM 180 re this
matter I had asked the Techo's
DataBase, Fleet and other
agencies re classification of the
gauges in use.
Critical Gauges and Non Critical
gauges:
I'd believed that not all the
gauges monitoring a fluid on a
particular system are critical, ie
the gauges in the MCR are
"critical" but a gauge on the
system elsewhere may not be
critical if the system is monitored
only at the MCR but the final
decision re gauges was to be
made by, in the current RAN, the
Systems Program Office or SPO
as applicable – ie do all gauges
get calibrated or do the critical
gauges get calibrated and the
non critical repaired by
replacement?
Costs = number of critical gauges
= number of hoke valves =
number of modified lines = the
Total Costs, equipment costs see
next.
Equipment
There were two suppliers of
calibration equipment in fact
FIMA 4 EAST and WEST had the
equipment in 1999/2000. The
number of test units would be
determined by the Ship Class to
be A&A to take the In Place
Calibration, whom to do the
actual work ie to calibrate the
gauges – would that be FIMA,
ships staff, sea riders (retired
MT/ET types Reservists with the
skills and time and the nouse to
do this job, which whilst not
exciting is so critical to machine
operation") etc?
Thus the number of calibration
units is determined by the
decision made reflecting the
"whom" ie whom is to do the task
and how to cover a particular
dependency in the times set by
the maintenance requirements
and the Class Society.
Comments
The idea of in place calibration of
ship-borne gauges in the RAN is
not new, two FIMA's had the
required equipment, training is
available in gauge maintenance
through the East Petersham TAFE,
FIME-AE sailors had done the
courses.
STATE OF PLAY
I left in 2000 and I do not know
the state of play re this matter.
TECHO's Data Base
My original comments re this
matter are in the Techo's
Discussion Database, under
Critical Machines or similar and
Gauges.
This is my slant on this matter,
savings in time, reduction in the
introduction of contaminations
into systems via un-plugged
gauge lines, and visible
compliance to the requirements
of Class Societies could be
accomplished by insitu
calibration of pressure,
temperature, electrical and other
gauges utilising modern
apparatus.
Regards
Bill Amor
1 MMES – Manager Maintenance
Engineering Services, the functions of
which have subsequently been subsumed
by CME – the Centre for Maritime
Engineering. (Ed.)
2 Orange Overalls was an article in the
March 03 edition of the Navy Engineering
Bulletin recounting LCDR Vaughan
Thompsett’s experiences while seconded
to a Merchant Marine Bulk Carrier, the
‘Pacific Triangle. (Ed)
3 A&A – Alteration and Addition (Ed.)
4 FIMA – Fleet Intermediate Maintenance
Authority (Ed.)
Letter to the Editor – ABMT
Conway HMAS KANIMBLA
Hi Sir
Read your article on the new
watchkeeping models. They sound
like really great ideas and I hope
that people take the time to try
and make them work. My
question is how are these
models, designed for the new
technology, going to affect us?