Planned maintenance can make the difference between a functional facility and a costly liability. Simply put, planned maintenance is a proactive strategy for asset upkeep using regularly scheduled inspections and repairs. The goal is to ensure that assets perform consistently throughout their lifespan and prevent unexpected failures.
The importance of planned maintenance cannot be overstated. If you need to improve efficiency, reduce downtime, and extend asset lifespan, a robust and strategic approach to your maintenance plan is essential.
This article offers a best practice guide to planned maintenance. We explore the various types of planned maintenance, their pros and cons, and demonstrate the value of planned maintenance software.
What is Planned Maintenance?
Planned maintenance can be understood as a proactive approach to scheduling inspections and repairs of assets and equipment. Unlike alternative approaches like reactive maintenance, which only address issues after they occur, planned maintenance uses strategic inspections, based on time, usage, and condition, to proactively assess assets. Scheduled inspections often involve routine tasks like lubrication, filter replacements, and component overhauls.
This data-driven approach identifies repair needs and schedules interventions, preventing failures and avoiding reactive repairs. The overarching goal is to ensure operational stability by preventing asset failure, minimising costly repairs and downtime, and extending asset lifespan.
Types of Planned Maintenance
Within the overarching strategy of planned maintenance, there are several distinct types of planned maintenance, each with its own methodology.
1. Preventive Maintenance
Preventative maintenance is a proactive strategy where inspection and maintenance tasks are regularly scheduled to prevent equipment failure ahead of time and ultimately extend its lifespan. Examples include lubrication, filter replacement, cleaning, and adjustments. It’s common to find preventative maintenance strategies applied across the manufacturing, transport, and energy industries.
2. Time-Based Maintenance
While time-based maintenance is a form of preventive maintenance, it specifically relies on fixed time intervals for scheduling tasks, unlike other preventive approaches that may consider usage or asset condition. This fixed schedule ensures consistent upkeep over time while minimising the risk of unforeseen failures. Common in transportation and aviation sectors, time-based maintenance often involves part replacements, oil changes, refurbishments, and overhauls.
3. Predictive Maintenance
Leveraging analytics software and monitoring techniques, predictive maintenance can anticipate when equipment failures are likely to occur, enabling maintenance to be performed when needed. This approach shifts from time-based schedules to a data-driven strategy, maximising asset uptime and minimising unnecessary maintenance. Predictive maintenance is used in manufacturing, transport, and technology sectors, facilitating tasks like vibration analysis to detect machinery imbalances, infrared thermography to identify overheating components, and acoustic monitoring to detect leaks or unusual noises.
Additional Maintenance Methodologies
Beyond these three types of planned maintenance are further specialised methodologies. Some are subsets of core types, while others offer distinct, complementary approaches.
- Condition-Based Maintenance (CBM): Maintenance triggered by real-time monitoring of an asset's condition.
- Risk-Based Maintenance (RBM): Maintenance prioritised based on the potential consequences of asset failure.
- Failure Finding Maintenance: Regular checks to identify hidden failures in protective systems.
- Usage-Based Preventive Maintenance: Maintenance performed based on asset usage, such as operating hours or mileage.
- Prescriptive Maintenance: Advanced analysis that recommends specific maintenance actions based on predictive data.
- Reliability-Centered Maintenance (RCM): A systematic process to determine the most effective maintenance strategies for assets.
- Routine Maintenance: Basic, recurring maintenance tasks performed to keep assets operational.
- Scheduled Maintenance: Maintenance performed at predetermined time intervals, regardless of asset condition.
- Calendar-Based Maintenance: A form of scheduled maintenance based on specific calendar dates.
- Total Productive Maintenance (TPM): A holistic approach involving all employees in asset maintenance and improvement.
- Deferred maintenance: The intentional delay of necessary operational repairs, often leading to increased long-term costs and potential asset degradation.
Advantages and Disadvantages of Planned Maintenance
Drawing on decades of firsthand experience, we have observed that planned maintenance significantly reduces downtime, extends asset life, and lowers costs by ensuring consistent optimal performance and reliability.
To maximise these benefits, organisations can integrate data-driven analytics into their maintenance strategies. Analysing past failures to predict future breakdowns enables a shift to a proactive, needs-based model. As decision-making becomes more data-driven and automated, planned maintenance becomes more efficient, reducing downtime, lowering costs, and improving asset reliability, all while minimising unnecessary interventions.
It should be noted that implementing planned maintenance does require upfront investment in labour, materials, and technology. Scheduling and coordinating maintenance can also pose logistical issues for some organisations.
Despite these potential challenges, the benefits of planned maintenance speak for themselves. There is no question that anticipating failures and recommending specific actions enhance asset reliability, optimise resource allocation, and drive substantial cost savings. By leveraging data-driven tools and software, informed by predictive and prescriptive strategies, organisations can develop a best-practice approach to planned maintenance.
Planned vs Preventative Maintenance
It is important to clarify the differences between planned and preventive maintenance, as the pair are often used interchangeably. The reality is that preventative maintenance is a type of planned maintenance. Think of planned maintenance as the overarching strategy, referring to any maintenance that’s scheduled in advance. In contrast, preventative maintenance is specifically focused on regular tasks like inspections, replacements, and lubrication to prevent breakdowns before they occur.
For example, a manufacturing facility might use a preventive maintenance approach to schedule monthly inspections of its conveyor belts, involving lubrication and visual checks for wear. This routine task is performed at regular intervals to prevent potential breakdowns. However, the facility's overall planned maintenance strategy extends beyond these preventive measures. They might also implement condition-based monitoring, using sensors to track the vibration and temperature of critical machinery. If the sensors detect abnormal readings, indicating a potential failure, a repair will be scheduled before the machinery breaks down. This data-driven, predictive approach falls under the broader umbrella of planned maintenance, encompassing a broader range of proactive strategies beyond simple, time-based preventive tasks.
The key difference here is that planned maintenance encompasses a wider range of proactive approaches, including predictive and condition-based strategies, while preventive maintenance is primarily focused on routine, time-based, or usage-based actions. Find out more in our guide to balancing reactive and planned maintenance.
How Planned Maintenance Software Can Help
Ask the consultants at SPM Assets, and they will tell you that they consistently see the transformative impact of a well-executed planned maintenance strategy.
This is where planned maintenance software and services, like the SPM Assets platform, become essential. These tools can automate scheduling, track detailed service histories, and leverage predictive analytics to anticipate failures before they occur.
By streamlining the maintenance process, your organisation could significantly reduce downtime, cut costs, and improve overall asset reliability. Ready to leverage the power of planned maintenance and unlock the full potential of your assets? Ready to make smarter decisions about your property assets? Get in touch today.