3 Quick Tips to Keep Your Machinery Running Smoothly

release date: 10/23/2016

tags: Machine Maintenance, OEE

Machinery breaks down. It’s just a part of the business! But with proper maintenance, your heavy machinery can go longer and longer without needing substantial repairs, meaning less downtime for your plant and more efficiency on the floor.

How can you keep your machines running smoothly run after run? Here are three quick tips for staying on top of maintenance issues.

1. Learn How to Recognize Signs of Wear

All machines and parts eventually wear, degrade, or misalign. The trick is knowing how to spot these little issues before they become big problems. Train your team to perform a daily “wear check” at the beginning and end of each shift.

This should include looking for signs of excessive vibration or shock, unusually high temperatures resulting from friction, and warping of belts, seals, and other malleable components. If something looks or sounds off, it probably is.

2. Keep a Clean Environment

Cleanliness around machinery is more than just regulatory red tape, it’s how to maintain a floor in excellent working order. Spills – of oil, lubricant, or even food – can clog machinery and attract pests over time.

Likewise, too much dust or refuse buildup can slow down your gears and belts, and even grind them to a halt if left untreated. In particular fields like woodworking, cleaning is particularly important to do because of the potential for high levels of slough-off. Compressed air cleaners are a good investment for regularly freeing your machinery of any stray mess.

3. Stay On Top of Maintenance

Preventative machinery maintenance is the absolute best way to avoid a full-scale shutdown. Not only should your staff be regularly undergoing training from experienced professional repair techs, but they should also either keep spare parts on hand or work with a company that has speedy access to a variety of replacement machinery parts.

A maintenance program that allows you to call in for over-the-phone troubleshooting can be invaluable for instances when an issue is small but tough to pinpoint. The most effective machinery maintenance happens before there’s ever even an issue.

Schedule Your Routine Maintenance & Repairs

Protech International is the right choice for regularly-scheduled machinery maintenance, on-site repair, and phone troubleshooting. We believe it’s just good business to give our customers the tools they need – both literally and figuratively – to get the job done quickly and without intervention when possible.

Call us today to find out how we can help your facility be more productive.