Alejandro Pérez Martínez is a Mexican native, residing in Puebla, a city with a million and a half inhabitants a couple of hours southeast of Mexico City. Puebla has a football team in the national top tier, but is possibly best known for being the centre of Volkswagen's Mexican enterprise. The brand's classic Beetle was still produced in Puebla in the early 2000s. Mexico, with a population of around 130 million, is an important market for Easy-Laser. Alejandro is an equally important person, having been one of our allies since 2015.
How did that start?
“Well, I first met Mikael Terner, CEO of Easy-Laser, and then gradually more and more people from Easy-Laser, and we just hit it off”, he says. “We have several interests in common, alignment of course being one. More and more companies in Latin America are looking into alignment, and Easy-Laser is recognized as a strong, global actor.”
But why this interest in alignment, and why now?
“They are starting to realize the importance of alignment as part of their maintenance and reliability work. Reliability seems to be on the agenda all over the world, including the countries where I work. How can they make their assets live longer and provide more stable uptime and productivity? They recognize that if they carry out alignment, it's really the start of higher machinery reliability.”
Learning by doing
So, the main thing you do is you travel to teach others about ... failure?
“Did you know that the global, annual cost of bearing failures adds up to 7.4 billion dollars?”, Alejandro asks rhetorically. “That's insane, but still not the most important factor. And shaft misalignment is responsible for up to 50% of all costs related to rotating machinery breakdowns. Also not very sane. Every time I give a lecture, or talk at a conference, or lead workshops, what I do is I design the presentation from experience. Most of my audience consists of maintenance people, and they can relate to what I'm talking about. I always try to be very hands on, using real items as props, touching them, rearranging them you know, in a tactile way. Children learn by imitating, but grownups learn by doing things themselves. That's why my lectures and the training I give will always combine theoretical stuff with practical.”
That sounds pedagogical enough.
“Absolutely, yes. Especially with the bearings, you need to touch, you need to smell, you need to see how they look. It's better to have the real thing there because it's what the people in my audience work with every day. Replacing a bearing, mounting a bearing, and so on. I can't just show them photographs of bearings. I need to have the real thing with me.”
So, what do they take away after an hour or a day with Alejandro Pérez Martínez?
“Haha, well, that's one of the things I always want to find out. When I'm done, I actually ask the participants what they have learned, and they can usually summarize that in a couple of sentences. I find it satisfying that I may have contributed to some change for the better even when it comes to guys who have been doing their job for 20+ years.”
"When I analyze a failed bearing, I'm not just seeing metal and grease. I'm seeing lost productivity, wasted resources, and potential safety hazards", Alejandro says.
Reliability and sustainability
What is it that makes you sought-after?
“Hm, it must be the specific talent that not everybody has, to transfer knowledge. Not very many people can do that. A lot of smart people with impressive and specific competences can still be disappointing when they try to convey their knowledge to others.”
When you talk about reliability, it sounds almost inevitable to also talk about sustainability.
“Yes, I agree. In Latin America we're still in earlier stages of the sustainability debate. I personally would like these companies to talk and act more in the sustainability field. It's a necessary thing for all of us. It's ultimately about taking responsibility, as humans and as companies. The connection between sustainability and reliability is there for everyone to see.”
The life cycle of a ball bearing
OK, but if we should talk a bit about the ball bearings. When did they enter your life?
“Well, in the early 2000s I worked for SKF, and that's the first time I came in contact with bearings. I worked for SKF in Mexico, and then for a time in the Netherlands. After that I founded Grupo MTF. Since 2012 that has been my work, my own company. A lot of traveling all over the Latin American countries, and always with the bearings in focus. I do have people working for me, but in the end it's a one man show, haha!”
So, SKF, the inventors of ball bearings?
“Yes, that's the claim, anyway. They gave me the opportunity to be out in the field, and I learned so much about this component. I consider myself a field engineer. I'm very passionate about that, about maintenance, about reliability, about people, because I'm not talking only about the machines. I'm concerned about the people. The bearings became sort of symbolic for all of these concerns of mine, my passion. Ultimately, this is how I became a bearing failure analysis specialist.”
I have heard Roman Megela, whom you know, say that the theoretical life cycle of a bearing is … forever. “And that's true. Most bearings will survive the machine. Then of course there are bearings of different qualities. The ones used in, for example, standard kitchen blenders won't need to be of the highest quality. But overall, of the ten billion ball bearings being manufactured every year, nine billion will outlive the machine.”
The benefits of increased reliability
Alejandro's focus, though seemingly on machines, is in fact on people. True, badly treated machines will break down and become scrap too early. But more importantly, before being scrapped, they will constitute serious threats to people's lives. Far too many examples of this exist.
So it's fair to say that you're on a mission?
“I am indeed! Having a forensic perspective is still necessary, but in the future there will hopefully be less accidents to analyze. Staying ahead of breakdowns will be the priority, first and foremost to save lives. Everything else, like prolonged life cycles of expensive machines and increased shareholder value, should be considered as a bonus.”
And how would you go about it? What's your suggestion?
“Let's talk about maintenance engineering and reliability engineering. The former is focused on efficient maintenance and repair, and if it's well carried out it can lead to less repair needs. This is achieved by learning how to perform maintenance before anything actually breaks. Reliability engineering, on the other hand, is focused on eliminating failures altogether. The key factor here is precision. By controlling the causes of breakdowns, which may include redesigning, you can actually save lives and money alike. Precision is crucial to real change. If you want to go from shaky, dirty, hot and noisy machinery to smooth, quiet, cool and clean, then precision is of the essence. Excessive vibration robs your machine of life length and reliability.”
Good news for shareholders
Of course, the main incentive is that increased reliability will not only affect a machine's life cycle in a positive way, it will also, and mainly, prevent accidents and actually save people's lives. The latter is by far the most beneficial effect, and should be more than enough to encourage change. In addition, company value increases when reliability does. This is good news for shareholders, among others. “Exactly. When we talk about reliability and proper maintenance, we're really talking about safety and human lives. A machine that breaks down unexpectedly can cause severe injuries or even fatalities. I've seen it happen far too many times. You know, when I talk about the 'terrible truth' behind ball bearings, I'm not trying to be sensationalist. The truth is terrible because it reveals how much unnecessary waste and danger we create through improper maintenance and alignment.”
As our talk comes to an end, he pulls out a small bearing from his pocket, holding it up to the light.
“The bearing is a precision part and must be treated as such. This simple component can tell us so much about a machine's history – and its future. When I analyze a failed bearing, I'm not just seeing metal and grease. I'm seeing lost productivity, wasted resources, and potential safety hazards.”
Alejandro continues:
“But here's the hopeful part – all these issues are preventable. That's the most important lesson to learn here. With proper alignment, installation, and maintenance, we can dramatically extend machinery life and reliability. And every single effect of doing so is positive. There's no downside whatsoever. All we have to do is convince everybody! That's what I do, that's my passion.”
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Name: Alejandro Pérez Martínez |
