Introduction:
Plant maintenance is an important service function of an
efficient production system.
It helps in maintaining and increasing the operational
efficiency of plant facilities.
Maintenance is the procedure of finding the faults in any
equipment/Machine and also removal of fault.
It may be before the breakdown or after the breakdown.
Plant maintenance usually refers to the methods, strategies,
and practices used to keep an industrial factory running
efficiently. This can include anything from regular checks of
equipment to make sure they are functioning properly.
The general aim of plant maintenance is to create a
productive working environment that is also safe for
workers.
Maintenance Objectives:
To increase functional reliability of production facilities.
To maximize the useful life of the equipment.
To maximize production capacity from the given equipment.
To minimize the total production cost.
To minimize the frequency of interruption in production by
reducing breakdowns.
To enhance the safety of the manpower.
Maintenance objective:
Importance of maintenance:
It helps in identify the cause of failure , e.g whether the
failure is due to design defect, or a wear out failure.
It also helps in deciding the type of maintenance and
maintenance decision like replace and repair.
It provides the necessary information regarding the life and
reliability of the equipment.
With the help of this tool spare parts management got
initiated.
Different type of maintenance:
Running maintenance
Preventive Maintenance Shutdown maintenance
Scheduled maintenance
Planned Maintenance
Breakdown maintenance
Corrective Maintenance
Maintenance
Shutdown maintenance
Predictive Maintenance
Unplanned maintenance Emergence maintenance
Planned Maintenance-
In planned maintenance the maintenance action is carried
out with some fore thoughts, prior planning , record keeping and
control action. These can be further classified as :-
Preventive maintenance
Corrective maintenance
Predictive maintenance
Preventive Maintenance:
It is based upon the principle that ‘prevention is better
than cure’.
It is a set of activities that are performed on plant
equipment, machinery, and systems before the
occurrence of a failure in order to protect them and to
prevent or eliminate any degradation in their
operating conditions.
Or the maintenance carried out at predetermined
intervals or according to prescribed criteria and
intended to reduce the probability of failure or the
degradation of the functioning and the effects limited.
It has three types
Running maintenance
Scheduled maintenance
Shut down maintenance
Running maintenance:
Running maintenance which includes those maintenance
activities that are carried out while the machine or
equipment is running.
Example – lubrication, adjustment of nuts and screws,
tightening of loose nut and bolts.
Scheduled Maintenance:
Scheduled Maintenance is any variety of scheduled
maintenance to an object or item of equipment.
Specifically, Planned Maintenance is a scheduled service
visit carried out by a competent and suitable agent, to
ensure that an item of equipment is operating correctly and
to therefore avoid any unscheduled breakdown and
downtime.
Good example of PM program is car maintenance. After so
many kilometers or miles oil should be changed, parts
renewed.
Shut Down Maintenance:
Which is a set of preventive maintenance activities that are
carried out when the production line is in total stoppage
situation.
These are performed generally after three or six months.
These involves the inspection of plant items which are
known or suspected to occur.
Corrective maintenance:
In this type, actions such as repair, replacement, or restore
will be carried out after the occurrence of a failure in order
to eliminate the source of this failure or reduce the
frequency of its occurrence.
It also include the different types of actions like typical
adjustment of redesign equipment.
The difference between corrective maintenance and
preventive maintenance is that for the corrective
maintenance, the failure should occur before any corrective
action is taken.
It is of two types
1. Breakdown maintenance
2. Shutdown maintenance
Breakdown Maintenance:
It is an emergency based policy in which the plant or
equipment is operated until it fails and then it is brought
back into running condition by repair.
The maintenance staff locate any mechanical, electrical or
any other fault to correct it immediately.
It is feasible for the small factories where
1. There are few types of equipment.
2. Machine and equipments are simple and does not
require any specialist.
3. Where sudden failure does not cause any serious
financial loss.
Predictive maintenance:
As the names implies it involves the prediction of the failure
before it occurs, identifying the root cause for those failures
symptoms and eliminating those causes before they result
in extensive damage of the equipment.
Type of maintenance performed continuously or at intervals
according to the requirements to diagnose and
monitor a condition or system. Also called condition based
maintenance.