Consequences of production stoppages for manufacturers have an impact on their productivity and can cause heavy losses.Beyond the financial risk, the inability to deliver quality finished products on time can be problematic and lead to a loss of customer confidence. To find out more about this topic, see our previous article on the 
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Avoid lack of energy with regular maintenance
Induced downtime is the time during which the means of production is inactive. The cause(s) of these shutdowns are external to the company: lack of supply, lack of personnel, lack of energy, room saturation, etc... Very often, production stoppages are due to organizational problems.
An electrical installation, it's a maintenance job. To prevent power failures, remember to check the condition of your installation regularly.
Examples of control and monitoring of some important elements:
- Keep the installation dust-free: vacuum or cryogenic cleaning.
- Periodically check the tightness of electrical connections (installation in de-energised condition). Incorrect connections are sources of overheating and can lead to a fire starting in your switchboard.
- In the absence of a tightness check, an infrared thermography should be carried out by qualified personnel using periodically checked equipment.
- Check the correct operation of the protection relays and triggers to ensure the protection of property and persons.
Have personnel trained to operate your low-voltage switchboard
It is necessary to know the good practices and actions in order to safely operate your equipment while respecting the material. To be able, after a power failure, to restart production quickly and safely.
It is also essential to train your employees to handle low-voltage switchboards by giving them electrical certification. Since the entry into force in 2012 of standard NF C 18-510, training for electrical certification is an obligation for any company with employees carrying out operations in an electrical environment, whether or not they are electricians.
Keep switchboard plans up to date
Up-to-date plans and user manuals allow you to react more quickly to a breakdown and make it easier for your maintenance partner to take care of it. For best efficiency, your documentation should be accompanied by spare parts stored in a clean and dry place. Regular check of its completeness and integrity is also important.
Have a maintenance plan
The maintenance plan defines the set of tasks that includes the activities, procedures, resources and time required to perform preventive maintenance. This preventive maintenance contributes greatly to the smooth running of your business:
Preventive maintenance makes it possible to anticipate risks and avoid urgent corrective maintenance.
For an effective maintenance plan, you have to define, according to what manufacturers, regulations and equipment behaviour recommend, the type of preventive operations.
Implementing a preventive maintenance action plan will benefit your entire company. In particular, it will make it possible to :
- Maintain production: any breakdown or troubleshooting of your electrical switchboard is detrimental to the profitability and productivity of your production line. On the contrary, prevention will make it possible to benefit from continuous production.
- Increasing the infrastructures' life cycle: preserving production resources means limiting the investments inherent in the acquisition of new electrical switchboards. Preventive maintenance ensures that efficiency of the production line is optimised.
- Reduce costs: Investing in a preventive maintenance strategy is financially more advantageous than early replacement of your electrical panels.
- Guaranteeing production quality: the ISO 9001 standard requires the implementation of the means necessary for product conformity. Regular maintenance of your electrical panel serves a vital function in this context.
- Improving working conditions: preventive maintenance limits the risk of accidents, facilitates the work of employees and contributes to their motivation.
Your manufacturer will be able to offer you a tailor-made maintenance contract that will perfectly meet your expectations.
Anticipate your needs by optimising and modernising your low-voltage installation
Replace old or obsolete equipment (retrofit solutions) which are less efficient and often the cause of breakdowns. Modernising your switchboard with connectivity also means predictive maintenance.
For example, the circuit breaker becomes capable of telling you:
- why it cut
- the number of times it cut
- the wear condition of its poles
It alerts you by text message or email that maintenance is required... and could even send a maintenance request directly to your service company by email or text message!
