The need to unexpectedly repair a piece of manufacturing equipment can be costly in so many ways – lost production hours, labour, parts, less product and ultimately less sales, yet still many companies don’t implement regular equipment maintenance into their schedules. Here’s 5 reasons why you should:
1 You control downtime
Downtime for any piece of manufacturing equipment is costly but being able to properly schedule this in and make machine adjustments during less busy times, means that you are in control of when this planned downtime occurs, meaning that it is less likely for a machine to breakdown just at that very moment when you need it for an urgent order.
2 Spare parts when you need them
A regular equipment assessment by a skilled expert will enable you to see what parts are coming to the end of their lifespan, so that you can order and implement spare parts on to the machine, minimising costly periods of downtime due to order issues.
3 Don’t pay a premium for parts
Ordering parts when not in a moment of crisis, due to equipment malfunction, also means that you can shop around and not pay premium rates due to the need to select the piece that gets there quickest. Failure to prepare means that you’re preparing to fail.
4 Increased machine efficiency
Just like a car, a regular spot of servicing can increase a machines efficiency and its overall lifespan, meaning that the financial output of paying for maintenance in the short term is actually less costly than not getting this done in the long term.
Without maintenance a machine is likely to be slower, breakdown more, produce more anomalies and eventually need to be replaced sooner than a machine that has been maintained, increasing the amount of times your company will need to pay large sums in capital investment/replacement machinery.
5 Spend less on experts
As manufacturing equipment grows old, the number of experts who know how to get them to work reduces too. The search for a maintenance engineer who can troubleshoot the problem with your equipment takes time, and of course, time is money. That’s why it pays to be prepared. By hiring an in house maintenance engineer, you have an expert readily available, so you don’t lose time and money searching and paying a premium for someone to fix a piece of equipment once its out of action.
Jonathan Lee Recruitment is here for all of your maintenance recruitment needs. Contact the team for more information on 01384 397555