{"id":4970,"date":"2022-02-16T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-02-16T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hirezdemo.xyz\/repair-and-maintenance\/"},"modified":"2024-09-10T00:33:46","modified_gmt":"2024-09-10T04:33:46","slug":"repair-and-maintenance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eptura.com\/discover-more\/blog\/repair-and-maintenance\/","title":{"rendered":"What are the differences between maintenance and repairs?"},"content":{"rendered":"

On some levels, there’s no practical difference between maintenance and repairs. They’re both tools you use to look after assets and equipment so they stay up and running.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

But when you’re running a maintenance department and trying to get as much as possible out of your budget, there are important differences between the two, and the better you understand the role you need each to play, the easier it is for you to cut costly downtime.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

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A quick review of the definitions helps show how they’re sort of similar but also very different.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

What are repairs?<\/span> <\/span><\/h2>\n

One of the easiest ways to answer this question is to change the “what” to “when.”<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

Repairs are the work you do after assets or equipment fail, and although that might seem obvious, it is an important part of the definition.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

Repairs come after failures.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

And because failure is an important part of the definition of repairs, it’s worth looking at failure and all its nuances<\/a>.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

Partial failures<\/span> <\/span><\/h3>\n

Most of the time, failures don’t go KABOOM. In fact, they can be even less dramatic than a screeching halt. A lot of failures are partial, which means the asset or equipment keeps on working, but it’s not working right.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

So, imagine you have a machine that makes tin cans, and when it’s perfectly tuned, it can make 100 perfect tin cans every ten minutes. A partial failure could mean it’s making 100 cans but now takes 15 minutes. Or, every ten minutes, it’s able to make only 68 cans. Another type of failure might mean it’s making the right number of cans in the right amount of time, but a lot of them are imperfect.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

Complete failures<\/span> <\/span><\/h3>\n

Again, there’s doesn’t need to a be a KABOOM, but you’re more likely to see a screeching halt. With a complete failure, your asset or equipment stops working altogether.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

This might sound worse than a partial failure, but it’s often better.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

If you have a pool heater than partially fails, you might end up with a pool that’s only 75 degrees while 78 to 82 is ideal. Or it might heat the pool for only six hours of the scheduled eight. Here, a partial failure is more an inconvenience than anything else. But if your tin can machine partially fails, you might be producing a lot of imperfect tin cans without even knowing it.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

Your machine doesn’t go KABOOM, but later on, your organization’s reputation might. <\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

What is maintenance?<\/span> <\/span><\/h2>\n

Again, we can answer the question more easily by changing that “what” to a “when.”<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

Maintenance is the work you do before assets and equipment fail. The reason you do it before the failures is because that allows you to avoid them as well as the associated repairs.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

You can divide repairs by types of failures, and you can divide maintenance into different maintenance strategies<\/a>, too:<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n