In cost-sensitive industries, such as food and beverage manufacturing, machine maintenance can significantly impact profit margins. The need for efficiency drives manufacturers to seek quick and effective solutions.
Predictive maintenance emerges as a valuable approach to address this challenge. Balancing tight margins, customer demands, and regulatory compliance presents complex hurdles for production and maintenance teams alike.
The consequences are seen in:
High speed machinery
Speed drives down costs, but parts tend to wear quickly under high loads. Efficient lubrication minimizes wear and heat build-up at friction points, and regular greasing and oil changes are part of the maintenance schedules. Safety must be maintained at all times.
Expectations for quality and consistency
Customers expect the same experience every time they consume the product regardless of when and even where it was made. Achieving this requires excellent process control, especially over variables such as heating and cooling.
Regulation
Food and beverage manufacturers are expected to follow Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) and comply with regulations like those imposed by the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA). This mandates documentation along with sound equipment maintenance practices.
Cleaning and sanitization regimens
Good hygiene practices are critically important but water and caustic chemicals create corrosive conditions lead to rapid wear of rotating parts.
Critical equipment
Upstream equipment such as chillers and mixers often feed multiple cooling, molding and packaging lines. Likewise, HVAC and air handling systems provide the environmental conditions necessary for hygiene and efficient processing. If any of these go down unexpectedly, other machines will quickly be idled, bringing production to a halt and wasting raw materials.
In the food and beverage industry, some of the most critical equipment that utilize condition monitoring to minimize downtime include:
- Processing Equipment
- Packaging Equipment
- Refrigeration Systems
- Pumps and Valves
- Boilers and Steam Systems
When margins are tight, as in much of the food and beverage sector, manufacturers must take every opportunity to drive down costs. As an enabler of predictive maintenance, Infinite Uptime offers businesses a way of anticipating future repair needs so work can be planned and performed in a cost-effective manner.
To Know more about Predictive Maintenance for FMCG Industry: https://www.infinite-uptime.com/predictive-maintenance-fmcg-industry/
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