Maintenance

Maintenance

In the engineering we are certainly no stranger to this term, yes maintenance. Maintenance can be applied both in the industrial world (to maintain production machines and building utilities), construction (to maintain construction equipment) or even in household appliances. No machine or tool can work for a long time without proper maintenance.

Well, in an industry, maintaining machines in good condition is very important. So what types of maintenance are there in an industry? And why is maintenance so important?

Maintenance Definition

Maintenance can be interpreted as the work of maintaining something (machine etc.) so that it is in good condition. As for maintenance or maintenance in industry is the practice of keeping equipment and machinery in good working condition for.

Maintenance can produce a quality product. The purpose of industrial maintenance is to increase the life of industrial equipment, keep all plant assets in good condition at the lowest possible cost.

Industrial maintenance is also called “Factory Maintenance”. Industrial Maintenance includes two actions, namely controlling or preventing the process of damage that causes machine or equipment failure.

Maintenance is also very important to keep all records of spare parts, machine service and repairs, equipment history, equipment manuals, and others.

Maintenance Purpose

Broadly speaking, the purpose of maintenance or maintenance is as follows:

1. Maintain equipment and supplies which are very important resources, especially in the industrial world, so that they can always operate properly so that the level of efficiency is high.

2. Prevent damage to equipment and supplies that have the potential to affect the performance of an activity.

3. Maintain the quality of the products produced so that they can be maintained according to the standards that have been set.

The maintenance has two philosophies that dominate the industrial maintenance approach.

So, the first and most common is that the role of maintenance is to “fix it” and the second and more successful is that the role of industrial maintenance is to “keep it run”.

Some people think these two goals are the same thing. But actually not. The two represent major differences in attitudes, approaches, priorities, and outcomes.

The fix-it philosophy is easy to implement and plays a role in the skills and abilities of technicians employed in the maintenance department. The downside is that it is more expensive to perform and leads to lower equipment uptime and a less profitable business.

The keep it run philosophy requires more management, support systems and regular maintenance. The advantage is that it leads to lower maintenance costs, better equipment uptime and higher profitability.

Maintenance Type

There are 3 types of maintenance :

1. Predictive Maintenance

Predictive maintenance can be defined as maintenance that detects the onset of a decline in machine function. So, predictive maintenance is more about detecting damage to prevent the machine from being difficult to control. The result of predictive maintenance is to show current and future functional abilities.

2. Preventive Maintenance

Preventive maintenance strategies require industry to proactively perform tasks according to a usage-based or calendar-based schedule. One common example is changing the oil in a car after running a few miles.

This maintenance can significantly reduce unplanned downtime by avoiding conditions that cause breakdowns. This one maintenance also reduces the risk of catastrophic failure with a reactive approach.

By investing in a preventive maintenance strategy, maintenance costs are reduced compared to when acting reactively. Savings are realized when considering safety standards, productivity losses and total repair costs. As with changing the oil for your car, by following a plan you can avoid more costly problems.

3. Reliability-Centered Maintenance (RCM)

RCM is one of the more specialized forms of proactive maintenance with an emphasis on being proactive. Similar to preventive maintenance strategies, RCM aims to avoid breakdowns by analyzing the best course of action to take. RCM develops tailor-made maintenance strategies, depending on what best suits a particular piece of equipment.

RCM takes into account the criticality of the asset in addition to the potential causes of failure and appropriate corrective action. The result is that equipment in the same facility can be assigned different maintenance strategies.

This way, you can allocate resources more efficiently if needed. For RCM to be effective, more information about assets is required than reactive or preventive maintenance.

A smart way to get and analyze data about your equipment is to use computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) software. With a CMMS, you can keep track of which types of equipment you want to maintain.

4. Prescriptive Maintenance

Prescriptive Maintenance takes predictive maintenance one step further by not only identifying changing conditions, but also providing recommendations for resolving issues. For example, a vibration sensor identifies a problem. Prescriptive technology recommends that equipment be slowed down to a certain level to extend production time before the asset is likely to fail.

5. Detective Maintenance

Detective Maintenance is an asset evaluation that serves to determine the root cause of failure when the asset is damaged. Detective maintenance is not condition-based maintenance, as the goal is not to look for signs of potential damage, but to test whether the asset is functioning properly. For example, you test fire extinguishers and smoke detectors that may be operating to make sure they work.

6. Reactive Maintenance

As the name suggests, reactive maintenance deals with the tasks that come after a piece of equipment breaks down. The advantage of reactive treatment is that the initial cost is significantly lower.

Maintenance tasks are only performed when the engine is already showing signs of poor performance.

The disadvantages of reactive treatment outweigh the short-term benefits.

The cost of doing maintenance is a lot because the possibility of damage can be permanent due to sudden failure.

These failures usually result in production losses, with worse cases causing critical equipment damage. For assets critical to operations, perform reactive maintenance only as a last resort.

Process or Maintenance Flow

Actually, the maintenance process or flow is different, depending on the type of maintenance specified. However, in general the process or flow of the maintenance itself is:

• Look for minor defects. This stage only experienced industrial maintenance people can detect faults in the tool.
• The industrial maintenance team must take appropriate action at this stage to deal with machine breakdowns.
• Next, the maintenance team must determine what type of maintenance is appropriate to implement.
• In the final stage, if it has been repaired but the machine is functioning so badly that it stops on its own, it means it is faulty.

Broadly speaking, industrial maintenance is an effort to carry out regular and routine cleaning, inspection, service, repair, or replacement of spare parts to prevent damage to machines or machine tools.

Do you understand what maintenance is in industry and how important it is to maintain it regularly? I hope this information is useful.