Best Practices for Maintenance and Repair

Is your's one of the 90% of companies in the U.S. that doesn't follow best practices for maintenance and repair? If your equipment suffers from frequent breakdowns, it probably is. Studies indicate that 70% of equipment failures are caused by a lack of following best practices for maintenance and repair. Of those equipment failures, 30% to 50% were due to maintenance personnel that simply didn't know the basics of maintenance; skilled maintenance personnel that chose not to follow best practices; lack of discipline or direction in the workforce; and/or management that simply didn't support or understand the consequences of not following best practices. It is due to the lack of following best practices for maintenance and repair that TigerTek's Greensboro industrial repair shop exists.

What are best practices for maintenance and repair?

1. Lubricate bearings at the proper intervals. The life of bearings is reduced by 20% to 80% when best practices are not adhered to or followed correctly.
2. Coupling Alignment. If motor couplings are not aligned using a dial indicator or laser alignment, you can expect premature coupling failure, premature bearing and seal failure in motor and driven units; and/or excessive energy loss;
3. V-belt tension must be measured regularly and set to specifications otherwise you can expect premature belt failures through rapid belt wear or total belt failure; premature bearing failure of driven and driver unit; belt creeping or slipping causing speed variation without excessive noise; and/or motor shaft breakage.
4. Hydraulic Component fluid must be conditioned to component specifications otherwise you can expect sticking hydraulic; premature or unknown hydraulic pump life; sustaining hydraulic competency by maintenance personnel; and lost production over the length of equipment breakdown.

Increasing Profitability Through Strong Repair Fundamentals

You can increase profitability through strong repair fundamentals by adopting Best Practices for Maintenance and Repair. That is achieved by (1) identifying whether a problem exists in your company by tracking repetitive equipment failures, reviewing capacity losses in production and identifying causes for these losses then measuring the financial losses due to repair issues; (2) identifying the source of the problem by assessing the skill level (both written and performance based) of your maintenance personnel and developing a proactive maintenance strategy then (3) training maintenance management and personnel on the new maintenance strategy followed by putting it into full implementation.