Regular maintenance of your company’s industrial equipment is non-negotiable to ensure smooth sailing in all your operations. But one of the biggest mistakes all companies make is reactive maintenance. Companies are not in control of the process by performing maintenance only when your machinery shows signs of failure.
So instead, preventative maintenance is a much better and cost-effective approach that can reduce the risk of equipment failure and enhance the tool’s lifespan. Check out this short guide if you’re looking for how to schedule and even run your annual machine maintenance process.
Why You Should Schedule Preventative Maintenance
There is only one opportunity when most companies can afford the downtime of their machinery: if it’s planned. Preventative maintenance is critical because it allows companies to take advantage of the opportunity to schedule maintenance before tool failure or breakdown. In doing this, companies save millions in emergency repairs and loss of productivity in downtime. When you plan maintenance, you can provide adequate coverage for any machine tool needs, making the process much smoother.
Preventative Maintenance Plans
Preventative maintenance plans are a bit different from the routine maintenance or reactive maintenance tasks that many companies perform regularly. They go much more in-depth into machine health and help tremendously reduce the risk of failure.
Here are some items to consider when creating your preventative maintenance plan:
- Identifying all maintenance objectives (such as reducing costs, optimizing operations, improving the quality of products, etc.)
- Identify all factors you need to keep track of your machinery to create a complete performance review.
- In-depth analysis of machinery performance to predict future issues rather than respond to them as they appear.
- Create a maintenance schedule and assist all staff and other resources needed.
Preventative Maintenance Checklist
Preventative maintenance plans give the company a broad view of the task at hand, but it can easily miss a few details. Therefore, a preventative maintenance checklist is necessary to ensure all these nuances are included in the process.
The checklist itself can be modified based on the particular types of machinery companies have, but they can include:
- Inspecting the outside of the machine
- Inspecting machine-specific parts
- Inspecting the electronics and other components inside the machine
- Monitoring the machine’s overall condition and performance
How To Manage Machine Maintenance
Manufacturer Recommendations
Machine manufacturers know best what strategies to employ to improve the longevity of a piece of equipment. Having these recommendations on hand during the machine maintenance process is essential. Companies can include these in their maintenance checklist.
Maintenance Strategy
While the overall scheduling of preventative maintenance is best during scheduled downtime in production, there are several types of maintenance strategies companies can employ:
- By date – Setting a specific date during maintenance, such as monthly, once every 6 months, etc.
- By the number of hours the machine has run – Scheduling regular maintenance based on the OEM recommendations.
- By issue – Scheduling maintenance based on specific alarms.
- By fulfillment – Scheduling maintenance based on completing other tasks
It’s important to note that no such strategy is better or worse by default. Deciding which maintenance strategy to employ must be based on the machines the company relies on and which method would help the company improve its lifespan.
How A Thorough Maintenance Schedule Ensures Longevity Of Machinery
Slow and steady wins the race. Rather than addressing machine issues as they appear or sticking to simple routine maintenance, broader preventative maintenance helps companies ensure their most necessary pieces of equipment work ideally when they are needed most.
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