Content about Industry

WINTER HAVEN, Fla. — Managing a laundry facility is a challenge, and when expensive equipment breaks down, the ability to repair it can hinge on knowing where to locate a single part.

During an Association for Linen Management webinar, Parts Are NOT Parts, David Chadsey, managing director of Capital Equipment Consulting (which recently changed its name to Laundry-Consulting.com), spoke about parts management and maintenance, focusing on the need for inventory and documentation.

Knowing what you have by way of inventory is the first step in documenting your machine maintenance, Chadsey says. At some point, every piece of equipment will need to be replaced. Understanding the process and planning for the inevitable will make the job easier to handle, he says.

Chadsey advocates documenting a machine’s usage and tracking inventory as means to understanding what equipment and parts a facility uses and needs. “Because if you don’t know what you use and don’t know what you need,” he says, “the day you need it, you’re probably not going to have it.”

Maintaining a parts inventory is important to keeping a facility up and running, he says.

When polled, every participant in the webinar indicated his or her “inventory system” was to simply look on the shelf when a part was needed.

Sources

Chadsey considers the most reliable source of parts to be the manufacturer and/or authorized distributor. These companies also have an advantage of knowing the laundry industry and generally know what a facility will need in the way of parts. Troubleshooting support often comes as part of the package as well.

“This has the lowest risk,” he says. “They built it, they represent it, (and) they really should know the part you need. And when it shows up, it has the greatest likelihood of being the right part.”

Since many of the machines used in laundry facilities are comprised of parts from other industries, local parts outlets may be an excellent alternative, he says. With competitive pricing, local supply houses typically offer faster delivery and availability. The one downside is that these businesses are not usually industry-specific, so the person behind the counter may not know much about laundry equipment.

Another source could be specialty parts makers, such as Industrial Wheels, Depend-O-Drain and C&W Equipment. Companies like these often advertise in trade publications, Chadsey says, and this source could help lower costs over time.

For any part that may need to be tooled, a local machine shop may be the answer. Chadsey suggests that a local machine shop can often handle a job at a lower cost and with a quick turnaround. Used equipment also may be of help, at a significant savings, he says.

The majority of the webinar’s participants indicated that they purchase parts from a manufacturer or authorized dealer, using a parts outlet or specialty parts manufacturer as a secondary source.

If a now-defunct manufacturer made a machine, a laundry manager may need to get creative when it comes to replacing parts, Chadsey says. Alternative sources become more important when a piece of equipment is not supported as it was the day it was purchased.

In addition to parts outlets, specialty manufacturers, used equipment and custom machine shops, former distributors and the manufacturers of individual parts may be able to help. Issues may arise, he cautions, if the machine has structural problems in addition to individual parts problems.

Replacements

When it appears that equipment will need to be replaced, Chadsey suggests looking at benchmarks before making the decision, including the cost of continuing its operation and an analysis of ROI.

When looking at the cost of operation, consider safety issues or the structural components of the machine; look at the cost of parts and labor, a prime reason to maintain documentation on the repairs for that particular piece of equipment; and be sure to include the cost of downtime.

When considering the ROI, look at the cost of the old machine vs. that of a new or different piece of equipment. This analysis also will help determine a predictable replacement schedule, which is an advantage when talking with senior management.

Chadsey encourages any laundry manager to maintain the documentation on every piece of equipment, to be more aggressive in tracking and maintaining inventory, and to know their regional and local providers of parts. Planning is key to keeping costs down for any facility.

Click here for Part 1.

ROANOKE, Va. — I spent a lot of time at the Clean Show looking at improvements in productivity monitoring systems. I find the benefits of using one worth the time and hassle of collecting and entering the data.

I talked to numerous vendors that had developed systems to provide instantaneous productivity monitoring of each workstation and employee. The more frequent and accurate the feedback, the better the results.

The ideal system would allow for tracking of both group and individual production data.

I have always tracked three areas in my soil-sort department. The most obvious is the five employees who sort the linen off a belt from an elevated platform into various slings. This has always been a group effort, and their production is based on how well they work together as a team.

My second is the two “dumpers” who place linen onto the incline conveyor feeding the elevated sorting platform. Their performance has a major bearing on the soil-sort group’s efficiency.

Finally, I track the employee responsible for unloading the trucks, weighing the soiled linen and placing the carts in the cart dumper.

I want a system that can instantaneously track the performance of all three areas with a minimum of data entry. The ideal system, in my mind, would be one where the carts are weighed into the system by scanning the bar code. When the cart is placed into the cart dumper, it is scanned again and the next poundage is credited to all three tracking areas.

I want a system that visually gives the employees or the group a graphic measure of how they are doing vs. standard. The simple system of a red, yellow or green light does not provide the type of detailed information I want my employees to see.

The preferred system will also be capable of supporting large screens that can be placed in the break room and the supervisors’ work areas. The break-room screen would provide peer review of the workers’ or group efforts, while the other screens would provide feedback to these key groups as to where their efforts need to be focused.

An employee or group that is not meeting production standards could be lagging due to several conditions. It might be the result of poorly sorted or improperly washed linen; pillowcases that are not properly conditioned cannot go through the ironer as fast as those that have the right amount of moisture, for example. The supervisor can investigate and take the steps necessary to correct this problem.

Poor production may be the result of improper or incomplete training. It might be a problem with a piece of equipment; the supervisor can work with maintenance and get it corrected as soon as possible.

An employee may simply need a little added motivation. Knowing that the system is there, and that someone is actually paying attention to it, can provide the needed encouragement.

The ideal system would allow for tracking productivity of each employee, each piece of equipment, the number of pieces of each type of linen produced, and the production rate for each piece of linen. It would track downtime by piece of equipment and be able to provide laundry management with actual productivity by area.

Labor is our single largest cost, and real-time productivity monitoring promises the ability to improve the use of this resource. I would expect that my laundry could improve productivity by 10-20%. With that kind of labor savings, it would not take long to justify the purchase of such a system.

"What aspects of inventorying and securing textiles pose the biggest challenge? What percentage of losses would you consider to be acceptable if the proper controls were in place? And how could an insufficient inventory impact the rest of my operation?”

Equipment Manufacturing — Joe Gudenburr, G.A. Braun, Syracuse, N.Y.

“To ensure that the laundry I manage is achieving top production on an ongoing basis, what records should I be keeping and why? Do you track anything out of the norm?”

Equipment Manufacturing: Joe Gudenburr, G.A. Braun, Syracuse, N.Y.

FAIRFIELD, N.J. — The Textile Care Allied Trades Association (TCATA) is joining in an effort led by the Coalition for Affordable American Energy (CAAE) to call for Congress to stay in Washington until it votes on legislation that opens off-shore drilling, enables oil-shale conversion and aids other supply-enhancing measures.