Equipment Maintenance: Role, Types & Objectives

Here is how equipment maintenance is important for your company! Suppose you have a big consignment that you have to deliver today. The delivery truck has left your warehouse on time. Everything is going well and as per the plan. But then you receive a call from your truck driver that the truck is not working. As a result, you apologize to your customer & inform him that, unfortunately, delivery will be delayed. You wouldn’t want that, would you?

Equipment maintenance provides great assistance in avoiding the above-mentioned & similar kinds of scenarios!

The main objective of equipment maintenance is to avoid machines and equipment breakdown & enhance performance. It includes equipment maintenance by performing several activities such as part replacement, repairing, and servicing. It ensures that the machine is operational so that production activity is not interrupted due to any machine issue.

Nowadays time is money! If your machines and equipment are down for some time or not working, that means you are losing money.

Therefore, equipment maintenance is very crucial for your company. Here are a few more instances that can result if equipment maintenance activity is not followed.

- Resource loss and production loss

- An unexpected breakdown can result in labor overtime

- Insufficient knowledge of the machine life cycle

- Scheduling work and projects again

In an organization, there are several assets; some of them are costly and some of them are very, very costly. Hence, you cannot follow the same practice for all assets and equipment. You may save money on economical assets but end up spending more money on the overall cost of assets.

Therefore, a smart strategy is important. But you can escape these problems with different types of equipment maintenance.

Overall, equipment maintenance can be divided into 2 parts. The first is scheduled maintenance and the second is unscheduled maintenance. And Scheduled maintenance can be divided into preventive maintenance and predictive maintenance.

Different Types of Maintenance Activities

1. Preventive maintenance

According to Wikipedia, Preventive maintenance (PM) is "a routine for periodically inspecting" with the goal of "noticing small problems and fixing them before major ones develop." Ideally, "nothing breaks down." The main aim of preventive maintenance is to make it to the next maintenance activity without any breakdowns and failures of machines and equipment. It includes activities such as partial or complete servicing at specified periods, oil changes, lubrication, etc.

2. Predictive maintenance

This maintenance activity is also done in advance, which means solving issues in advance. This activity is more like a precaution to escape problems. The main objective of predictive maintenance is to determine the condition of equipment & machines in order to know when maintenance activity can be done.

This is one of the promising ways of cost-saving. It also helps in estimating the degradation stage of an asset, equipment, and machine. (Both of the above are proactive maintenance activities that take place after a particular period of time, such as 30 days or 45 days, especially predictive maintenance).

3. Corrective maintenance

This is a reactive activity in nature. It is executed when any defect or fault occurs in an asset, machine, or equipment. Corrective maintenance restores the equipment depending on the fault. It includes various steps after failed equipment, such as diagnosis, the cause of failure, then ordering a replacement part & installing a new part, then testing functionality and continuation of the process.

The corrective maintenance can be divided into two parts: immediate corrective maintenance and deferred corrective maintenance. In the Immediate corrective maintenance process, one has to take quick action right after the failure.

On the other hand, deferred corrective maintenance, in this process, the maintenance activity is scheduled for later; there can be many reasons behind it. Such as, replacement parts might not be available, it may take a long time, or technicians are required on some other high-priority cases.

4. Routine maintenance

The main objective of routine maintenance activity is cleaning, oiling, lubricating, replacing batteries & changing the oil. Routine maintenance activity can take place on a weekly or half-month basis. It depends on the equipment's work.

As a professional equipment maintenance practice, one should keep an emphasis on maintenance rather than repairment. In simple words, to keep your equipment in good working condition, routine maintenance should be done on a regular basis.

5. Emergency maintenance

This activity is a reactive equipment maintenance activity. The main objective of emergency maintenance is to prevent a threat to lives, the property of a company. Emergency maintenance can be applied to keep the facility operational and safe. Emergency maintenance is mostly used in chemical plants, tenant buildings, etc.

Conclusion

When you do not take care of your assets, machines, and equipment efficiently, then your company might end up in a loss, but it can be avoided if equipment maintenance activity is done. The activity can extend equipment life; one should definitely do equipment maintenance at regular intervals.

If you need assistance in equipment maintenance, we can help you all the way. We also provide a free 14-day trial.

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