We added a 10-minute FLIR sweep at 05:30 on all lift gearboxes last month and caught a pillow block running 18°F over baseline, which spared us a noon pull-and-inspect. What handheld units and delta thresholds are you trusting, and how are you logging — by asset tag with baselines or just photo archive?
FLIR C5; alarm at +12°F over baseline after warmup; tag in CMMS; emissivity tape helps — @ridewrench, same?
I get better trend hits by locking the temp range on an E6‑XT to last week’s min/max per gearbox so autoscale doesn’t hide gradual creep. Caveat: wind throws readings on exposed pillow blocks — shield with a clipboard and give it about 10 min at load before judging. @fionaS34 do you lock range or trust auto?
But on our lift gearboxes I flag either +15°F over ambient or a >3°F week‑over‑week climb, whichever hits first, and I clip a K‑type on anything suspect to ground‑truth the IR. Each shot saves to the asset via QR in the CMMS so the image, emissivity, and span ride with the tag, with baselines bucketed by ambient bands (40–60, 60–80, etc.). Let the camera warm up 2–3 minutes so it isn’t the hottest thing in the room — IR needs its coffee — @ridewrench do you tweak thresholds for partial‑load test cycles?