MAINTENANCE

Foodlube for the machine masses

Food-grade lubrication is an important cog in the maintenance plans of many food and beverage plants. Food & Beverage Industry News explains.

With food production ramping up as people stockpile in the midst of COVID-19, reliability has never been more important – both in terms of product performance and the supply chain.

And it’s not just the supply chain of the goods themselves that is in the spotlight, but the products and services that keep those products in full production – the plants, machinery and back up service.

In order to keep everything running smoothly, a high-quality, food-grade lubricant is needed, and the ROCOL FOODLUBE range is designed to keep plant and machinery in top shape. Distributed by industrial products specialist, BSC, ROCOL fits the bill in many ways, according to BSC national key account manager, Steve Keown.

“ROCOL FOODLUBE has NSF certification, which is globally recognised, and it is also HACCP certified and the products are made using registered ingredients by the USDA and FDA,” he said. “They’re free from nut and soy oils, free from genetically modified ingredients as well. For a certification approval level, they’ve certainly got all the global checks in place.”

Most importantly, during these times, BSC has a large amount of stock of its range in its various warehouses around Australia. Not only that, but it has engineering staff that are on call and available 24/7 to help. Being Australia wide, the company can get product to customers very quickly. This is important – not only for planned maintenance – but in situations where unexpected downtime might occur due to the heavy use of machinery.

Emilio Seballos is the Channel Manager for Heavy Industry at ITW Polymers and Fluids (ITW P&F), the company that owns the ROCOL brand. Based in New South Wales, Seballos knows from first-hand experience how well BSC comes to the party in terms of support, and even helping open up new markets for products.

“Working with BSC is very good. Over the years our relationship has grown significantly,” he said. “They are really easy to work with because they are able to add value on top of providing products. Not only are they able to provide the bearings, the chains etcetera, we can then come in and help from a specialist lubrication standpoint.”

He even goes one step further when it comes to what BSC can do for those running the plant and machinery that keep the food and beverage industry chugging along.

BSC are definitely solution sellers, he said. “BSC offer solutions because they are already providing a technical service from the standpoint of bearings, belts, chains, lubrications and those sorts of things. They are already dealing with customers of our products on a technical level, so there is an excellent synergy between what they can do and what we can supply to industry.”

An example of this collaboration can be seen through both BSC and ITW P&F working together to conduct site assessments at a Global food manufacturer’s operations based in NSW. As a result of the site assessments, BSC and ITW P&F identified that the plants had an excess of stock holdings and were able to brand rationalise to the ROCOL brand and cut their stock holdings by up to half.

The experience from the NSW site was then transferred to the global food manufacturer’s Tasmanian sites. The team at WebsterBSC – BSC’s sister company – were then able to conduct a thorough lubrication survey of two of its food processing sites.

The WebsterBSC team worked in conjunction with ITW P&F, and analysed the lube stores in both operations. Similar to the NSW sites, the result, according to WebsterBSC sales rsepresentative Rick White, was a rationalisation in the number of lubricants that the factories had on site from 25 different lubricants down to only 10 products. “ROCOL products are very versatile and can be used in a range of applications. By using ROCOL lubricants, the factories were able to reduce their lubricant inventory considerably – which made stock management a lot simpler and more efficient,” White explains.

To elaborate on the versatility of the ROCOL products, White introduces some of the products that WebsterBSC and ITW P&F recommended as part of the survey program.

“For example, the ROCOL FOODLUBE Premier 1 grease is an all-round grease that can protect ball, roller and plain bearings, slides and bushes in water wash offs,” he said.

“The FOODLUBE Hi-Power hydraulic oil and FOODLUBE Hi-Torque gear oil also have some

ROCOL FOODLUBE is important when it comes to keeping moving parts in good working order.

great features. We’ve supplied them successfully to major food manufacturers in Tasmania and nationally, with great customer satisfaction,” he added.

White, who works at the WebsterBSC Burnie branch and has been involved in the sale of industrial and engineering products for over 47 years, said continuous support is BSC’s secret to maintaining a lasting relationship with customers.

“When the same food manufacturer required hydraulic gear oils as part of their scheduled annual maintenance shut down, WebsterBSC was able to supply the order within just one day to avoid any unwanted delay. Our customers know that they can trust us to support them when they need it most.” F