Preventive maintenance: 6 tips for better management

Preventive maintenance: definition and tips

Preventive maintenance involves the maintenance and revision of organizational assets in order to keep them in optimal operating conditions. Systematic inspections and observations make it possible to detect and correct problems before a failure occurs.

The establishment of a planned maintenance program becomes mandatory when the quality of production is affected due to faulty equipment, or when the repair cost is too high due to an unexpected revision.

The aim of planned maintenance is to extend the life of equipment and tools by anticipating potential breakdowns. Establishing this process ensures reliable and efficient plant performance, ensuring that equipment does not break down when it is needed most. Machine wear increases over time: thus, the preventive replacement is very effective, as it consists in intervening before the failure occurs rather than waiting for it to occur and suffering the potential consequences.

The calendar feature offered by Mobility Work allows you to plan all your preventive and predictive maintenance interventions.

Benefits of preventive maintenance

Some of the direct benefits of planned maintenance include:

• reduction of breakdowns
• reduced downtime
• security
• increased economic lifespan of assets
• improvement of production.

Implement an effective preventive maintenance program

1. If a program is already in place, update it frequently

If your program hasn't been fully updated recently, it probably doesn't contain the right activities anymore. And without this content, your planned maintenance routines can't deliver the results you want. It should be noted that inspections and revisions do not cause any interruption in production, and are carried out on equipment that is in operation. The main questions when setting up or updating a program are:

• What can be the consequences of the failure of a component for the company?
• What maintenance resources and techniques should be deployed in order to detect a failure before it occurs?
• How often should scheduled maintenance inspections be carried out?

2. Creation and implementation of a planned maintenance plan

A planned maintenance plan ensures the quality of all company services by predicting breakdowns, which makes it possible to improve the production cycle. This must contain all the relevant information, as well as all the objectives assigned to production, the number of parts produced or services offered, the list of interventions, etc.

The analysis of failure modes, their effects and their criticality (FMEA) makes it possible to determine the level of criticality of an equipment in relation to its various functions.

How to determine the type of maintenance and actions to be implemented according to the level of criticality?

All maintenance operations included in the plan must meet the following 3 requirements: applicability, efficiency and profitability. An operation is applicable if it can be implemented; it is effective if it reduces the failure rate, and is profitable if it contributes to the improvement of production.

The periodicity of an intervention is defined according to the manufacturer's instructions, the history of operations and corrective tests, and reliability allows for analyses to be planned. In all cases, the periodicity is not a fixed value, and must evolve according to the feedback from the maintenance team and the evolution of the equipment.

There are other major activities related to the maintenance plan, including the development of the spare parts list, which lists all the parts that have been removed or replaced at each maintenance stage, and at each location.

3. A modern CMMS allows you to plan your maintenance

Mobility Work is a new generation maintenance management platform, composed of a CMMS, a social network and a marketplace. Each member is connected to thousands of professionals from a wide range of industries (automotive, rail, railway, food, chemical, construction, materials, pharmaceutical, metallurgical, mechanical, mechanical, textile, electronics, etc.). Mobility Work makes it possible to improve daily maintenance routines thanks to an ergonomic interface, a mobile application, features such as an ultra-fast and innovative search bar, calendars and alarms, intervention reports, document management, an analytics tool, an analytics tool, preventive maintenance plans, etc. In addition, the maintenance management platform can easily be connected to the ERP or any other intelligent system including sensors that allow you to generate predictive analyses, etc. In addition, the maintenance management platform can easily be connected to the ERP or any other intelligent system including sensors that allow you to generate predictive analyses. dependable. A SaaS CMMS makes it possible to significantly improve company performance thanks to better efficiency during interventions and better budget management.

The platform now allows manufacturers of machines and consumables, as well as service providers to register their company profile, and add their products to the official catalog. Users can use the official catalog to search for a supplier, and providers can now connect with potential customers directly through the platform.

All the news relating to current interventions are available from the news feed of the Mobility Work mobile application, available on iOS and Android

4. Integrate all possible measurement tools

The most frequent checks include oil and vibration analysis, thermography, non-destructive testing (penetrant testing, ultrasonic testing), and wear and amperage measurement. This data is collected and analyzed in your CMMS, and is put into perspective with respect to other available data, such as the history of interventions and the inventory of spare parts, in order to provide relevant information.

5. Think of planned maintenance as a “lean” tool

Preventive maintenance is an essential element of total preventive maintenance (TPM), linked to the Japanese concept of 5S (seiri - remove the unnecessary, seiton - storage, seiso - cleaning, seiketsu - order, shitsuke - rigor), and is considered an essential Kaizen tool.

6. Follow the 7 basic elements of planned maintenance

Effective preventive maintenance consists of 7 main steps: testing, maintenance, maintenance, calibration, inspection, adjustment, alignment, and installation. All members of the maintenance team must be familiar with the subject and be able to implement them.

Planned maintenance is an essential part of every company's total preventive maintenance program. Its effectiveness is based on 6 main elements, with which every professional should be familiar. Once properly implemented in the company's maintenance plan, these elements make it possible to improve the health of assets, limit equipment failures, and thus improve production and optimize costs.

Are you interested in maintenance management and want to know more in order to increase your productivity and save money? Schedule a free video with our team to help you better manage your maintenance!