The Role of Crash Maintenance in Maintenance Strategies and its Comparison with RTF

As maintenance professionals, we rarely use the term Run To Failure (RTF). However, the term Breakdown Maintenance is more commonly used. In my previous article, I tried to explain the details of the RTF maintenance strategy. In this article, I will provide information about the Breakdown Maintenance strategy.

Although Breakdown Maintenance and Run To Failure maintenance strategies are included within the Corrective Maintenance Strategy, there are some differences. Corrective Maintenance, in terms of its application content, is the complete opposite of the Preventive Maintenance Strategy.

What is Breakdown Maintenance?

Breakdown Maintenance can be defined as a maintenance activity applied in response to an unplanned failure in equipment. However, unlike the Run To Failure system, this is an unexpected and undesirable situation.

Planned Breakdown Maintenance: At this point, the possibility of a failure has been somehow identified, and measures are taken to reduce the impact of the failure.

A good example would be when an operator notices a noise coming from the conveyor belt, informs the maintenance team, and a planned production stoppage is implemented to replace the bearing on the belt roller.

Unplanned Break-in Maintenance: In unplanned break-in maintenance, equipment stops unexpectedly, resulting in an unplanned production stoppage to perform maintenance.

An example would be a sudden production stoppage due to the burning out of the adhesive jaw resistor on a packaging machine.

Break-in maintenance offers no benefit to the business. A business with many break-in maintenance activities cannot be said to be doing maintenance work. A team adopting such a strategy is always on alert, waiting for a breakdown. Due to the high frequency of break-in maintenance activities, wear and tear on equipment, an increase in urgent tasks, and an increase in breakdowns and production stoppage times are observed over time.

Businesses experiencing these types of problems would benefit from at least quickly transitioning to a planned maintenance approach.

The Run To Failure (RTF) strategy is a more specific and detailed version of unplanned maintenance. What makes unplanned maintenance more versatile than RTF is that it also includes unplanned downtime events.

Because it is a more general approach, organizations can apply unplanned maintenance to all types of equipment. Conversely, RTF is used only on disposable, short-lived, and non-critical assets because it requires careful planning and documentation.

“Run To Failure” Maintenance	Breakdown Maintenance
The equipment is operational until a malfunction occurs prior to maintenance.	Maintenance activities are performed on faulty equipment. They are divided into planned and unplanned types.
It happens due to equipment failure.	It happens due to equipment failure.
Maintenance costs are low.	Maintenance costs are on an upward trend.
With the right approach, the earnings can be high.	There is no cost saving.
Preventive maintenance can reduce costs. It enables task prioritization. It prevents the intensity of maintenance activities.	The maintenance team must be prepared for emergencies. It requires fewer maintenance personnel in the short term.
It loses its effectiveness due to lack of planning and implementation. An increase in downtime is observed if implementation is inadequate. The risk of crisis is high.	Finding the root cause of the failure is difficult. Unplanned maintenance activities strain resources. Efforts are made to bring the equipment back into production without prioritizing safety. ·