Maintenance management is the practice of controlling maintenance material and activities to preserve assets (or repair them) to a sound working condition. In other words, you should preserve your organization’s assets to ensure the production process is not interrupted and the organizational resources are used effectively.
This important practice used to be a tedious one, where someone (usually the maintenance manager) had to document the organization’s equipment, their maintenance needs, and when what type of maintenance task must be performed on each of them. Thanks to technology and CMMS software, this practice has changed from exhausting to effective.
Which actions should you perform to successfully complete a work order? This is not always such an easy question to answer, as different equipment requires different maintenance tasks. So, let’s break it down.
CMMS – or – Computerized Maintenance Management System – is software that is centered around the maintenance tasks of an organization and the planning, measuring, and tracking that accompanies these tasks. This software optimizes each aspect linked to maintenance through its digital nature.
So, what are these maintenance tasks anyway and how do you link them to the correct equipment?
Important equipment, such as those in production lines, must be kept in working condition at all times to prevent unexpected downtime and a break in production. Therefore, scheduled discard tasks are used to replace a particular part of a machine, irrespective of its performance capacity, at specific, scheduled time slots. These tasks are thus proactive in nature and contribute to an effective preventive maintenance strategy.
For equipment that needs, for example, fluids to run, a scheduled restoration task is of great value, as one does not inspect the machinery to repair it, but to ensure everything is in order for it to stay in working condition. This type of task requires the maintenance manager to examine equipment thoroughly, as a regular activity, to establish the condition of the machinery. The goal is to restore a piece of equipment to its initial operating condition, for example, with enough oil or water to complete its tasks.
Applicable to all equipment is inspections. This task requires the maintenance manager to thoroughly inspect the machinery and determine what labor, tools, or materials are needed to service them. Since many equipment pieces move to complete actions, the maintenance manager has to look at these while they are busy with their tasks. This will ensure one gets a complete picture of a machine’s maintenance requirements.
For pieces of equipment or parts of machinery that are not obvious, in other words, beneath the surface and out of sight of regular inspections, failure-finding tasks are important. This task is necessary to improve the reliability of your equipment, as the parts that are hidden often have protective purposes and without protection, equipment tends to fail more often and more severely.
For complete peace of mind, it is recommended that all of these maintenance tasks are completed, and since this could turn out to be quite a tedious task when done traditionally, one should definitely consider implementing a CMMS.
Proteus CMMS will not only detect maintenance errors but also keep track thereof to let you know when you should do inspections. This software can also issue work orders to fix the errors. These work orders will be sent to the appropriate technician and before you know it your equipment’s maintenance will be completed, meaning, you will always be able to avoid unnecessary downtime!
Proteus MMX allows you to manage multi-location inventory, purchasing, service requests, and work order management. To find out how Proteus MMX can help you with maintenance tasks call Eagle at 262-241-3845 or send us an email or schedule a demo.
