Industrial Maintenance Explained: What It Is, How It Works, and Who It’s For

Industrial maintenance refers to activities that keep the machinery, systems, and infrastructure of an industrial facility in good condition and increase its lifespan and efficiency.

Imagine this. In the middle of a bustling factory floor, the CNC machine, usually the quiet workhorse, suddenly emits a grinding noise. The line supervisor rushes over, hoping it’s nothing.

But it’s not nothing. The spindle is jammed, and the team is stuck wondering how something so preventable is now halting production.

Here’s how: The team didn’t prioritize industrial maintenance because of a busy production schedule.

This is exactly the situation industrial maintenance is intended to address. Your maintenance program helps prevent failures and fix them quickly if they do occur.

In this guide, we look at the basics of industrial maintenance, as well as four types of industrial maintenance and when to use them.

Key Takeaways

• Industrial maintenance minimizes unplanned downtime, which directly impacts production continuity and profitability.
• A robust maintenance program improves worker safety by preventing equipment failures that could cause accidents.
• Combining various maintenance strategies helps minimize maintenance costs while maximizing asset performance and uptime.
• Thorough records of industrial maintenance are critical for compliance. While paper-based records and spreadsheets are traditional methods, most modern companies use CMMS and other types of industrial maintenance technology.

What industrial maintenance looks like in the real world

Industrial maintenance looks different for different industries and work environments. However, its impact is similar across industries; it reduces downtime and improves asset efficiency.

Picture a bread factory at 2:30 a.m. Conveyor belts are humming. Dough mixers are spinning. The team is halfway through their nightly target of 10,000 loaves to be delivered to supermarkets by 6 a.m. Then a dough mixer stops, pausing a line that makes 300 loaves per minute. 

A few moments later, a maintenance tech walks in with the materials to fix the mixer. Condition-based monitoring alerted her that the mixer was reaching a critical temperature threshold. She took a calculated risk, holding off on a repair because production was tight, but ordered the spare bearing and tools to be prepared if a breakdown occurred. By 3 a.m., the mixer is back on.

That’s what industrial maintenance looks like. It’s not just about fixing what’s broken. It’s about avoiding failures and being prepared to tackle them quickly if they occur.

From assembly lines to cold storage: Where it happens

Industrial maintenance goes well beyond your assembly line; all operational environments in your industrial facility require maintenance. Here are examples of other areas in your facility that need maintenance:

• Logistics: Conveyor systems, automated storage and retrieval systems (AS/RS), forklifts, and barcode scanners all require regular upkeep.
• Utilities: Even as a manufacturing company, you need to test, inspect, and take preventive care of pumps, transformers, and HVAC systems to ensure your teams always have access to electricity, an optimum working environment, and other necessities.
• Energy facilities: Your maintenance team needs to monitor and perform preventive maintenance on control panels, steam or cogeneration systems, and solar panels. This ensures these systems stay in good shape and minimizes the chances of interruption in energy supply.

What’s actually maintained? Machines, systems, infrastructure

When thinking of industrial maintenance, most people imagine technicians replacing worn-out bearings, greasing conveyor belts, or tightening bolts on presses. In reality, maintenance goes far beyond machines.

Here’s an overview of what industrial maintenance is performed on:

• Machines: This is the most obvious item on the list. Machines may require lubrication, calibration, and repairs, depending on the machine’s type and condition. We’re not just talking about machines on the assembly line. Other systems, such as conveyor belts, automated storage and retrieval systems (AS/RS), and barcode scanners, also require regular upkeep.
• Systems: Systems coordinate and control operations. For example, think of automation and control systems, programmable logic controllers (PLCs), IoT sensors, or SCADA systems. A glitch in one of these can halt production just as suddenly as a mechanical failure.
• Infrastructure: Taking preventive care of systems that don’t directly participate in production but support your operation is mission-critical. Think about the electrical plants in your industrial manufacturing plant, for example, transformers, circuit breakers, backup generators, and switchgear that deliver power to machines. If any of them fail, your production line might come to a halt.

The four types of industrial maintenance (and when to use each)

There are four types of industrial maintenance that are appropriate in different situations. Let’s look at the four types of industrial maintenance and when they should be used.

Corrective maintenance

Corrective maintenance refers to repairs or replacements performed after you discover a problem but before that particular machine fails. This is different from reactive maintenance (or emergency maintenance), where repairs happen after a failure event.

For example, suppose your tech is performing a routine PM check on a hydraulic press. They notice a pressure valve that’s drifting out of range. It hasn’t failed yet, but it’s not performing optimally.

You log a work order and swap out the valve the next day. That’s corrective maintenance.

Corrective maintenance is a low-cost strategy compared to the rest on this list. It’s perfect for non-critical assets where failure won’t cause major safety or production consequences, repairs are quick and inexpensive, and you can easily replace the asset.

Preventive maintenance

Preventive maintenance is planned, scheduled, and performed at regular intervals. It’s most suitable for equipment with predictable wear and tear, such as motors, conveyor belts, HVAC systems, and forklifts.

Technicians follow a schedule, regardless of whether the asset actually needs maintenance. That’s why preventive maintenance has less applications for low- to mid-value assets where repairs or breakdown costs aren’t as significant. 

For example, imagine performing maintenance week after week on an asset that has little to no chance of failing or few signs of wear. You could just let the asset break down and fix it if the repair costs are minimal. This way, you avoid hours of planned downtime and save your technicians plenty of work.

That’s why preventive maintenance is best for critical assets with predictable but costly failures. For example, think of a truck. You might decide to change the truck’s oil every 3,000 miles. This works because:

• The asset has a known wear-out pattern.
• A failure could impact production, but not severely.
• The cost of scheduled maintenance is lower than the cost of unplanned downtime.
• The asset is moderate in value, so you may not be able to economically justify predictive tools.

Speaking of predictive tools…

Predictive maintenance

Predictive maintenance uses sensors to monitor asset data, such as temperature, vibration, noise, and more, to detect subtle signs of deterioration.

The data is sent to a model, often an AI or ML model, that processes real-time data, compares it with historical data, and predicts failure events.

Predictive maintenance is a good strategy if:

• You need lead time to plan spare parts and labor.
• You’re running expensive commercial or industrial machinery like CNC machines, turbines, or compressors.
• You have historical data to feed to the AI/ML model for predictions.

If you’re open to investing in sensors and tech required for predictive maintenance, it’s an excellent way to minimize costly downtime.

Most companies reduce the frequency of preventive maintenance (or eliminate it entirely) over time after predictive maintenance takes over for any given asset. This helps you optimize maintenance costs without jeopardizing the asset’s health.

Condition-based maintenance

Condition-based maintenance (CBM) is similar to predictive maintenance. Like predictive maintenance, CBM relies on sensor data to detect anomalies so you can perform or prepare for repairs before failures occur.

But there’s one key difference: Predictive maintenance looks at data over time and compares it to historical data to find a brewing problem. On the other hand, CBM looks at real-time data and alerts the user after the reading breaches a defined threshold.

As a McKinsey article explains, “In situations in which predictive maintenance is not mandated by the risk involved or the ease of predictability, but a business still wants to keep a close watch on its equipment, CBM can provide useful insight.”

For example, suppose you mount an accelerometer on your CNC machine.

The data says the vibration pattern has gradually worsened over three months. Your predictive maintenance system predicts the spindle motor will fail in about two weeks, so the maintenance team schedules a repair one week from now.

However, that’s not how CBM works. CBM doesn’t correlate real-time data with historical data to predict failure. It monitors data for predefined thresholds.

For example, your CBM system might alert you when the CNC machine’s RMS vibration exceeds 6 mm/s, assuming that’s your predefined threshold, but it doesn’t make a prediction.

Why industrial maintenance matters (for safety, efficiency, and ROI)

Industrial maintenance is a cost center, but you stand to gain a lot from investing time and effort in preventive care. Here’s what industrial maintenance does for your facility:

Lowers unplanned downtime

Industrial maintenance is your first line of defense against unexpected downtime. Proactive inspection, servicing, and maintenance prevent production lines from unexpectedly falling silent. This can save you a ton of money; unplanned downtime costs the world’s 500 biggest companies 11% of their revenues, totaling $1.4 trillion (that’s equivalent to Spain’s GDP).

Keeps workers safe

Every loose belt, frayed wire, or leaking valve is a potential safety hazard. Industrial maintenance eliminates these hazards and reduces the risk of malfunctions that can cause injuries or fatalities on the job.

Inadequate worker safety can damage your company’s reputation and employee morale, and you might also end up paying anywhere between $16,000 and $165,000 to OSHA as a penalty, depending on the severity of the violation.

From ensuring proper machine guarding to making sure emergency systems function when they’re needed most, industrial maintenance ensures a safe working environment.

Supports production targets and audit readiness

Unplanned downtime disrupts production schedules. When business is growing fast, you can’t afford an unexpected failure disrupting your production schedule. Maintenance keeps assets in good condition and improves efficiency. This helps reasonably reduce the chance of unexpected failure and improves production efficiency.

Maintenance is also critical for compliance. Several regulations require proof of maintenance, such as maintenance logs, inspection records, and calibration certificates. Ensure that you have these handy at all times so you’re prepared for any surprise visits from OSHA or other regulatory bodies.

Most modern businesses use a computerized maintenance management system (CMMS) to store maintenance records and related documents. A CMMS automates the maintenance workflow and creates an audit trail with zero extra effort. It’s essentially an all-inclusive app to run your maintenance program—it lets you create work orders, assign them to a technician, and communicate with technicians should they need any help while performing maintenance tasks.

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