Failure to develop a sound maintenance strategy will lead to the collapse of any manufacturing operation. The maintenance needs of every organization will deviate in some way from another, but the goal will always remain the same. Preserving the integrity of machinery is often done through one of two different strategies, preventive and predictive maintenance.
Beginning with the former, preventive maintenance is a very traditional approach for organizations around the world. This strategy includes performing maintenance to all required machinery or equipment in an organization’s fleet at regularly scheduled intervals throughout the calendar year. Now, it’s critical to understand that each piece of machinery will likely receive maintenance at different times of the year. The reason behind this is that each of these machines differ in characteristics like age, average run time and even how much available down time is permitted for a particular component of an organization’s fleet. As such, this approach can create a challenge of keeping up with a messy maintenance schedule throughout the year but will always keep an organization’s equipment in solid shape.
The more diagnostic approach comes from predictive maintenance. This strategy disregards the regularly scheduled maintenance of its counterpart. Instead, it employs a particularly complex system of technologies attached to the IoT to collect data on each piece of equipment or machinery in an organization’s fleet. This data is then analyzed in real time to indicate when a piece of equipment would require maintenance. This, in turn, makes this the more efficient maintenance approach.
One thing to note about predictive maintenance, however, is the cost. Much more expensive but is becoming simpler to implement as the years go on. As more and more technologies find their way into the Internet of Things ecosystem, the possibilities continue to expand. The moment these predictive maintenance systems are installed, they’re able to capture and record performance and external data of an organization’s fleet. This data can then be analyzed to provide insight into when a particular machine may require maintenance in addition to revealing the problem area that requires maintenance. Which in turn leads to greater efficiency as a result of less downtime required for critical machines.
While these systems may seem like the most obvious choice, barring any cost concerns, there is also some inherent risk associated with them. The first being the cost versus benefit your organization could get out of this investment. In some cases, organizations don’t benefit nearly as much as expected compared to other organizations with a much larger scope. The next is the training required to bring employees up to speed with regards to these newly integrated systems. For some long-standing employees, this can prove to be extremely difficult. This may often require a complete overhaul of the training they received with past systems and will require a great deal of patience before any mastery is acquired. If your organization is capable of facing and conquering these challenges, this change might be the right choice.
Preservation of any piece of equipment is imperative for the sake of long-term success in the industry. Any organization still unsure of how to tune their maintenance strategy, spend some time reviewing the infographic coupled alongside this post. Courtesy of Industrial Service Solutions.