Are we the doctors of industry?

"You guys are the doctors of industry!"

That was a quote said to me when giving a tour of our facility to some non-engineer types.

There are so many similarities with the industrial repair and maintenance industry and the medical profession. We diagnose, cure, bring back from the dead, improve and help prevent failures from happening.

It's a brilliant and quite accurate quote indeed, so I hope you'll excuse me trying me best to look a bit 'doctor like' with my equivalent of a stethoscope around my neck.

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Instead of a stethoscope, I've got my go-to, front-line diagnostic tool. My trusty Fluke Corporation 1587 FC insulation multimeter.

This is always at the top of my tool bag and it gives me the ability to perform triage on so many bits of equipment and machinery. No wonder there is the generic term 'multimeter'.

From checking for dead and phase comparison, continuity in panels.
Continuity, resistance comparison, IR, PI and DAR on electric motor windings. True RMS voltage output and output frequency of inverters.
Checking the input and output stages on VSDs, (I've been teaching apprentices that trick with the diode function recently)
4-20mA signal confirmation.
Capacitor values.
Resistor confirmation and values (yes, my eyesight isn't that good anymore - Anyone remember BBROYGBVGW?)
Along with numerous domestic and classic car problem solving tasks.
Temperature measurement is probably the only thing that I don't use this for.

So, from diagnosing problems on electrical panels, electric motors, inverter drives, servo drives and power supplies, this is my go-to tool. And of course we've got more sophisticated diagnosis equipment in the workshops for more in depth investigations. Yes, I do still get involved with diagnosing faults when I can.