Proper Maintenance Scheduling

One of the biggest factors in worker job satisfaction is work planning. Few things will de-motivate your maintenance techs than having poor job planning. This results in having the wrong tools at the jobsite, multiple trips to the parts crib, and hours of rework for a failed fix.

We often work hard to carefully plan and schedule our preventative maintenance requirements. We prioritize the job, research prior jobs, list the job steps, conduct hazard analyses, and then list parts and tools required. Before we send our techs out, we make sure the proper permissions are obtained and the process can be stopped for the maintenance. All these steps ensure that we are not wasting our people’s time.

Corrective maintenance requirements should be no different. When a conveyor belt stalls, we should to be able to do the same thing. Unfortunately, we are usually in a reactive maintenance environment, with a huge push to get production back on line. What can we do to limit the down-time, yet minimize the re-work and wasted maintenance time?

Let Equifactor(R) give you a hand. When that conveyor belt goes down, conduct a quick Equifactor(R) analysis of the failure. What caused this failure? Before your techs get to the jobsite and modify critical evidence, give them an idea about what they need to be looking for. Should they plan on removing the drive motor? Could the idlers need adjustment? By having these answers in hand prior to arrival, your techs know what tools to bring, what safety hazards may be present, and what parts they are likely to need. This will also prevent their inadvertent modification of important evidence as to the reason for the failure.

Don’t send your maintenance personnel in blind for corrective maintenance. We wouldn’t do it for a preventative maintenance item; why treat this type of job any different?