MechChem Africa August 2019

⎪ Maintenance and asset management ⎪

Preventative maintenance: the key to sustainability By Eugene Brown, Services Manager at Smith Power Equipment

T he significance of preventative maintenance in the capital equipment equation cannot be reiterated enough. Benefits include operator and machine safety, machine efficiency and time savings, among others. All these point towards one direction – optimal total cost of ownership (TCO). One of the key drivers in the TCO calculation is the frequency and costs associated with unplanned maintenance, or as everyone expe- riences it, breakdowns. Modern equipment is becoming increasingly complex, and with this increase in complexity, comes increased risks associated with breakdowns. Whilebreakdowns canoftennot beplanned for, following a regular, well-documented maintenance schedule will allow the equipment ownertoestablishbest-practicepreventativemaintenanceactions.For example, regular monitoring of the oil condition in a hydraulic system will show a wear trend, and when there is a sudden increase in wear materials, it will allow the equipment maintenance team to remove the relevant component and inspect it to ascertain the reason for this sudden accelerated wear. This type of intervention and repair has proven tobe cost-effective, as opposed to blindly allowing the component to self-destruct, and then having to pay for an expensive component. The “if it’s not broken, don’t fix it” approach is still commonplace across many industries, but one thing is for sure – it is not a sustainable approach to equipment ownership. Meanwhile, a strict preventive maintenance regime means that you are assured your equipment is operated under safe conditions, both for themachine and the operators. Possible issues can be nipped

in the bud before they have a chance to cause harm. Health and safety of employees is also a business prior- ity across industries – but perhaps it takes greater precedence in mining and construction, where the risk of serious accidents and injuries is sig- nificantly higher. In terms ofmachine efficiency, nor-

mal wear and tear can result in lower machine efficiency. Preventive maintenance assures optimal working conditions and conserves the lifespan of the equipment. The old adage, “time is money” still holds true. Planned preventive maintenance may cause small hindrance in terms of production, but that is nothing compared to actual downtime caused by a breakdown. Because it is planned, production canpropose theoptimal time and can factor in the nuisance. Preventativemaintenance procedures take less time than emergency repairs and replacements. At Smith Power, our products are all world leaders in innovation, qualityandvalue. Themaintenanceof theequipment iswhat ultimately will allowour customers tobenefit fully fromthe pedigree of our prod- ucts, so it is obviously a very big focus of ours. From a trends perspective, telematics, easy access to affordable tribology and smarter equipment are just few of the many advances that have come about in the monitoring of condition of machinery in themarketplace.We embrace all of the available technologies, and are currently investigating. q

August 2019 • MechChem Africa ¦ 15