Author: Bill Welch, EVP of Operations, MINER
“Most things I worry about don’t happen anyway.” – Tom Petty
With apologies to the late and very great Tom Petty, he never had a fleet of vehicles, a facility full of equipment, budgets, compliance issues, energy costs, and a team of warehouse employees to think about. If he did, he’d be worrying about things. And inevitably, they’d be happening.
One broken part. A stalled vehicle. Worn out equipment that poses a safety risk to employees. Machinery malfunctions that lead to defective products and subsequent reworks. Old equipment that increases energy costs or may become out of compliance.
A reactive maintenance strategy to these inevitable issues creates a scattershot approach, stressing teams, increasing the risk of errors, and costing the company time and money. With a proactive strategy, you could worry a lot less.
Don’t Do It Like That: The Maintenance Worry List
A reactive strategy can easily lead to the following:
- Increased safety risks: Worn-out equipment can pose safety hazards to employees. Malfunctioning machinery may lead to accidents, injuries and even fatalities. These threaten workers’ well-being and result in liabilities for the company.
- Higher energy consumption: As equipment wears down, it often becomes less energy efficient. And you have no idea how much until the energy bills come. The longer a machine isn’t checked, the longer it can run inefficiently.
- Inconsistent product quality: Equipment operating below peak condition may lead to higher defect rates or costly reworks, affecting customer satisfaction and the company’s reputation.
- Stress on maintenance teams: Crews are often working under pressure to fix breakdowns as they occur, with no idea when the next one is coming. This can lead to burnout, increased errors, a backlog of repairs, and a lack of time to address other important maintenance tasks.
And this is just scratching the surface. A reactive strategy isn’t necessarily one of neglect. But it increases your odds of the unexpected happening.
Breakdown. Go Ahead and Give it to Me.
As the age-old phrase goes, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
But it’s not accurate.
Perhaps we should be saying, “If it’s not broken, look for potential issues to make sure it won’t break anytime soon and you’re not scrambling to fix it.” It’s not as snappy, but it makes a lot of sense. Just like a proactive strategy.
While people “talk” about being proactive, see its merit and want to do it, it’s harder to implement in practice. For one thing, it feels like a lot; having to understand the differences between when and how to apply scheduled, runtime-based, condition-based and predictive maintenance seems daunting without help. For another, knowing where to start and the nature of auditing all your equipment feels like more work than it’s worth. For yet another, the assumption is that a return on investment may take time to be realized. Plus, it seems counterintuitive to invest and spend when you don’t see something to fix.
However, with the right partner and mindset, a proactive maintenance strategy becomes easier to implement and pays off from the start. With tighter constraints on manufacturing, more demands for productivity and the uncertainty of supply chains, it’s more important than ever to control what you can. Like the way you approach your equipment upkeep.
Now that we’ve made a case for proactive maintenance, check out Part 2 to see how to put a plan into action.
Contact MINER to see what our SafeACT proactive maintenance program can accomplish for your facility.