Maintenance is not merely a cost… Maintenance is an Investment!

“No Maintenance -> No Rock -> No Money”

Alan R. Bessen, P.E.

Fix it when it breaks?

It is not uncommon in the aggregates industry to presume that if a machine is still running, then no maintenance is required.  The “fix it when it breaks” approach is often called Reactive Maintenance in that action does not take place until an equipment failure occurs.  Reactive Maintenance is really not “Maintenance” at all; it is repair and completely disregards the lost production cost related to downtime, ignores reduced machine performance during the failure process and overlooks the added repair costs or replacement costs associated with catastrophic failure. 

Maintenance Alternatives

A Preventive approach to maintenance is a necessary element for any successful maintenance program.   By scheduling inspections, lubrication and critical component replacement based on hours of operation or production tonnage, reactive maintenance can be reduced.  There will always be some reactive maintenance and there is no question that with or without maintenance, a machine will run until it fails.  The question is when will it fail and what is the cost of the failure. 

 

Predictive Maintenance (PdM) is the most technologically advanced element of a maintenance program.  It uses microprocessor-based technology to evaluate the condition of operating equipment.   The most common PdM methods used are vibration analysis which indentifies misalignments, imbalances, bearing faults and gear box faults in rotating mechanical equipment and infrared thermography which detects heat related faults such as loose connections, imbalanced electrical phases and shaft misalignment in electrical equipment. 

 

The purpose of PdM is to provide current data on operating equipment condition.  Data is acquired at appropriate intervals, analyzed and trended to measure changes in condition.  Alarm levels are established and used to prioritize maintenance, repair, and overhaul or replacement. The ability to repair faults before failure occurs minimizes the impact of unplanned downtime on production and repair cost. 

Maintenance is an Investment

When equipment is purchased it is expected that its output will generate income and the initial purchase cost is considered an investment.  It would seem to follow naturally that the same investment consideration should be given to decisions related to maintaining equipment in that inadequate maintenance results in downtime, lost production and less income.

 

Decisions related to costs of Preventive and Predictive Maintenance along with maintenance labor, employee training, outside support and spare parts inventory should all be evaluated as investments.   Consider projected costs of proper maintenance against the lost value of extra production cost related to unplanned downtime, added costs related to poor performance during a failure process and the added repair costs associated with catastrophic failure.   If there was justification for the original investment in equipment then there must certainly be justification for investment in properly maintaining it.

Conclusion

Inadequate maintenance ALWAYS results in reduced production, ALWAYS increases cost and ALWAYS reduces profit.  

A proper approach to maintenance will:

• Reduce downtime by reducing unplanned outages caused by equipment failure.

 

• Reduce repair cost by preventing minor maintenance issues from becoming major repair issues, by reducing time spent troubleshooting and by reducing catastrophic high cost failures.

 

• Increase production by reducing downtime and increasing efficiency, resulting in higher production output.

 

• Increase profit by increasing production output and decreasing repair costs, leading to lower unit cost of production.

 

The objective of any maintenance program is to ensure the reliability and productivity of equipment.  Effective maintenance is as important to an operation as the original equipment purchase.  Because, without maintenance eventually there will be no production; and without production there will be no profit.

 

 “No Maintenance -> No Rock -> No Money”