Maintenance departments face several challenges in the quest for excellence. The first step in creating a successful maintenance program is to identify and prioritize the key areas that need to be addressed. Many of the maintenance issues shown in Figure 1 are common across industries and companies. The basis for most maintenance programs is a work order system.
Work order management is the way in which a company manages maintenance activities, from request to execution, completion and record keeping. Using a paper-based approach may be suitable for small operations, but it makes it difficult to find equipment and maintenance history. For example, looking at the history of a pump may mean that a technician is sitting in the workshop flipping through a large folder. Managing work orders on paper increases work inefficiency and does not align with the sustainability values or green initiatives of many companies.
The work order management process is essential because all maintenance activities require a work order. Whatever the methodology used, it is important to think about the general work order process and how the key elements of that process will be managed. Good work order management strategies streamline the maintenance process and offer maximum organizational value. The last step in managing the work order is to document any updates (p.
ex. CMMS or EAM systems are often considered the foundation for robust work order management programs. They tend to offer a high return on investment when implemented correctly. One of the essential benefits is that, over time, they create a history of asset management and maintenance.
Once the company determines what information it needs, the next step in the process is to create a history or library of maintenance information. Organizations can choose to do this in several ways, but one of the most common is to use a CMMS or EAM system. The advantage of creating this history in a CMMS is that it is available on the same system that manages the management of work orders, making it easier to access. However, there are fundamental elements to building a good foundation for successful maintenance.
Four key elements are work order management, empowerment with technology, obtaining asset and maintenance intelligence, and the transition from a reactive to a proactive maintenance approach. These components can offer key benefits, such as reducing unplanned downtime, increasing work efficiency, extending equipment life, and reducing overall maintenance costs. Join more than 14,000 maintenance professionals who receive monthly tips on the CMMS, industry news and updates. Effective preventive maintenance consists of 7 major milestones.
These are testing, maintenance, calibration, inspection, adjustment, alignment and installation. All members of the maintenance team should be familiar with them and apply them accordingly. Effectively planned preventive maintenance (PM) programs offer substantial savings. Studies show that preventive maintenance can save facilities up to 18 percent in maintenance costs.
A work order is a document that provides details about a maintenance task and describes the process for completing it. In addition, CMMS simplify, automate, organize and optimize O%26M. A whopping 58 percent of facilities rely on the CMMS to manage their maintenance operations. Approximately 96 percent of office executives say that miscommunication is to blame for failures in.
Maintenance departments are no exception to everyday communication problems. Predictive maintenance (PdM) aims to predict faults before they occur so that maintenance can be done at the right time. PdM uses machine sensor data and intelligent technology to alert maintenance staff when equipment is at risk of failure. For example, a sensor can use vibration analysis to alert maintenance staff that equipment is at risk of failure, at which point it will be disconnected, inspected, and repaired accordingly.
Reliability-Centered Maintenance (RCM) addresses the fact that faults are not always linear. The RCM is a very complex process that seeks to analyze all the possible failure modes of each piece of equipment and customize a maintenance plan for each individual machine. The ultimate goal of RCM is to increase the availability or reliability of equipment. An effective plan must cover all the features of your facility's maintenance policy.
The program must contain a comprehensive inventory of the assets you need to maintain. The list, which includes numerous items, such as boilers, pumps and roofs, ensures that no vital asset is omitted. There are many other types of maintenance that work well for all types of organizations, from small stores drowning in paperwork orders to data-based business operations, for which predictive maintenance is a reality. For the efficient maintenance of your assets, you must demonstrate the set of skills needed for each maintenance task.
Preventive maintenance software, such as a computerized maintenance management system, will be able to help you calculate these metrics with ease. Preventive maintenance is an important element of total productive maintenance (TPM), which encompasses the Japanese concept of 5S (seiri: elimination of unnecessary things, seiton: order, methods, seiso (cleaning, seiketsu) control, shitsuke (discipline) and is considered a fundamental kaizen tool. All members of the maintenance team should also be aware of these triggers so that no maintenance task goes unnoticed. Preventive maintenance involves the care and maintenance of the organization's assets to maintain them in satisfactory operating condition through systematic inspections and observations to detect and correct defaults before a total breakdown occurs.
And remember that a well-designed preventive maintenance program isn't an unattainable dream for maintenance operations; it's a viable option for everyone. For an organization that comes from a pen-and-paper or Excel-based maintenance program, it must first rely on the processes and knowledge provided by preventive maintenance to create an effective predictive maintenance plan. Companies have varying degrees of maintenance complexity to overcome and are at various points on the maintenance program development curve. At the end of the day, preventive maintenance will help you overcome inefficiency and improve your maintenance program from start to finish.
Many companies continue to struggle to compare maintenance performance and implement effective maintenance programs that generate measurable improvements. A challenge for maintenance departments is that robotics can change the skills that maintenance technicians need. For example, if the analysis of the data shows that the last three faults of a pump occurred shortly after it had been in service for 2000 hours, scheduling a preventive maintenance (PM) activity at 20:00 can prevent the pump from failing. Preventive maintenance is proactive maintenance that is regularly performed on a piece of equipment in working condition to avoid unplanned failures or breakdowns (maintenance).
Because scheduling routine maintenance based on usage or weather triggers reduces the likelihood of unplanned equipment failures, which translate into expenses. . .
