Sitting around and waiting for the parts on your machine floor to fail seems highly counterintuitive, right? Many managers and engineers across the country are happy to do this rather than replacing parts and components proactively – that is, before they fail. Finding the optimal balance for maintenance can save your factory costly interruptions from a time and revenue standpoint.
In spite of this, whilst pre-emptive replacement of parts can potentially avoid failure, it can also hinder you from getting the most out of a part and prematurely end its functional lifetime, meaning you are not getting the full benefit of a component. Using a part for its full life span makes your company much more efficient financially; it’s like chucking away food well before its use-by date.
So with this in mind – how do you strike that balance between being too overcautious and being lax where too much of both will end up unnecessarily costing you money? Developing a condition monitoring strategy as a maintenance schedule allows you to strike that balance and find a happy medium. Integrating sensing technology, you can continuously analyse the performance of your parts and be aware of any changes to vibration, temperature, and pressure. Your engineers will know when there is a requirement for intervention, allowing you to maximise the life of your part, but to make a change before it fails, saving your time and your money.
