Optimizing Linear Motion Mixers: Altoona Water’s Predictive Approach

In wastewater treatment, reliability isn’t optional— it’s paramount. Altoona Water Authority knows this firsthand. Their equipment has to run day in and day out, and when something goes wrong, the cost isn’t just financial—it risks operational delays, added maintenance time, and increased safety hazards for plant personnel when reactive maintenance is required during an unexpected failure.

On March 5th, Altoona Water’s Linear Motion Mixer 2 triggered a severe alert in SMARTdiagnostics. An abrupt spike in vibration readings stood out from the usual trend and was flagged immediately by the system. A KCF SENTRYsolutions analyst reviewed the data and confirmed that the sharp spike in the waveform looked like a brief impact event— potentially a sign of something working itself loose.

KCF recommended a quick visual inspection. Within hours, plant staff took a look and confirmed what the data had already suggested – structural looseness leading to a misaligned shaft.

Altoona Water responded through Desk to confirm the team had found the root cause during their visual inspection. Two bolts holding plate assemblies together had stripped, causing them to loosen. The team replaced the damaged bolts during scheduled downtime and secured the plates.

Following this repair, trendlines showed that vibration levels dropped dramatically, returning to healthy baselines almost immediately. Visual confirmation in Desk validated the resolution and showed sustained improvement.

After seeing such a clear resolution, Altoona Water is now deploying this fix on all of their Linear Motion Mixers. On top of preventing 8 hours of downtime from this single incident, the insight gained from a single alert is now being scaled to prevent future issues across multiple assets.

Altoona Water Authority will see the full value of these fixes over time, all deriving from this catch during the first 30 Days of their $199 Pilot.