Maximizing production efficiency: The importance of preventive maintenance

In today’s plastics injection molding manufacturing world, experiencing unscheduled downtime due to a machine breakdown can be an expensive and painful experience. In addition, it often occurs at the most inconvenient times, such as when you have tight deadlines or are just about to ship parts to a customer. Therefore, machine reliability and repeatability are critical for maintaining a successful business. Adopting a preventive maintenance strategy and following maintenance routines are essential to avoid disruptions in production and remain profitable.

Injection molding machines and automation are complex and need continuous monitoring and care to maintain a high level of performance. Both well-established and cutting-edge preventive maintenance techniques can be used to ensure the injection molding machine can produce on time, all the time. Here is a comprehensive plan that you can implement to establish regular preventive maintenance routines for your entire team, maximizing your uptime and productivity.

Unscheduled downtime in injection molding

Unwanted production stoppage is a crucial topic in injection molding as it negatively affects the ability to produce parts that meet customer needs. ENGEL machines are designed to run well, and customer demands are not being met when they are not running. One way to prevent unscheduled downtime is to listen to the machine. And this has not changed over the past two decades - ENGEL machines give telltale signs when they are not functioning correctly, which can lead to a disruption of the production process and have severe consequences.

Reasons for unwanted stoppage

There are some key reasons why a machine goes down unexpectedly if you don’t follow regular maintenance routines:

TIP: Creating checklists for routine preventative maintenance

A checklist can be a valuable asset for routine inspections. The list does not have to be anything elaborate. It can be as simple as the top ten things you want to look at without getting overly technical. Logical yes or no questions are sufficient to help identify possible issues that can result in a production stoppage. If any questions are answered with a “yes”, then the maintenance group can be notified and address the issue if detected early on. This can save on downtime and repair costs.

Preventive maintenance routine: Walk-around inspections for the machine operator

So now it’s time to get to the how-tos your team can employ to reduce unscheduled downtime. These should be routine maintenance procedures for every machine operator. At the start of each shift, they need to do a basic walk-around:

Reasons for & actual impact of an oil leak

One of the most common reasons for an oil leak is the heat exchanger is plugged up, creating an inadequate exchange of cold water versus hot oil. Another cause is a choppy cycle or erratic movement of the clamp, with rapid acceleration and rapid deceleration. With this, you get constant heating of the hydraulic hoses. This heating, over time, will lead to oil leaks. It’s necessary to check the heat exchanger filter to make sure the incoming tower water is clean or else the filter can get clogged leading to overheating. If the oil temperature is over 125 degrees for a significant amount of time, it will lead to oil leakage. Keeping the oil temperature around 110 to 115 degrees is ideal to prevent overstressing the hydraulic system. After the walk-around inspection, the operator must note and tag the location of any oil leaks detected.

But what is the true impact of an oil leak? Firstly, it’s a definite safety hazard. Oil on the floor can lead to slipping or tripping. The next is the cost, this number can add up quickly as you must consider the cost to clean up the leak, the cost to dispose of the waste oil, the cost to replace the oil and the cost of the machine downtime itself. The leakage could start with as little as one drop every 10 seconds. Over time, this can lead to a stream of oil leaking. A small stream could be as high as 24 gallons a day, translating into hundreds of dollars per day in wasted oil, labor, and disposal fees. If you multiply that by the number of machines running in a plant, the costs could add up to several thousand dollars a day, beyond the waste in lost production time.

Preventive maintenance routine: Walk-around inspections for the maintenance team

Since every injection molder is different, it is up to the individual company to decide on the frequency of a maintenance routine, whether daily, weekly or another schedule, whatever works for your production needs. This second-level inspection goes beyond and works in tandem with the machine operator’s operational and functional injection molding machine inspection.

Preventive maintenance routine: ENGEL service support

The day-to-day activity can be overwhelming in a fast-paced manufacturing environment. ENGEL provides goods and services to ease and support our customers’ operations and maintenance routines. Not only can we help get your ENGEL machine running at its optimal level, but we can also offer services to help lengthen the life cycle of the machine:

Read more about ENGEL care & other service packages.

TIP: The most overlooked preventive maintenance methods

When performing preventive maintenance to avoid unwanted downtime, it is essential not to overlook certain maintenance routine checks. A reliable method is to use our sense of smell. In many cases, a possible failure can start out with a minor smell, like the smell of burning plastic could indicate a nozzle leak. The odor of burning rubber could mean an electrical issue. And the smell of hydraulic fluid most certainly reveals a hydraulic leak. Early detection of these odors can prevent more significant problems and save time and money. The next sense we can use is hearing. Listening to your injection molding machine is crucial to your maintenance routine. A sound that is not normal could indicate an issue, for example, the squeal of a bearing, the whine of a hydraulic pump, the chatter of a hydraulic valve, the slamming of the mold, or the ejector plate bouncing. It is worth listening to what the machine is telling you.

Greatly reduced downtime

In conclusion, reliability and repeatability are key factors in injection molding machine performance. A carefully constructed predictive and preventative maintenance plan is therefore essential. Machine operators and in-house maintenance staff should perform consistent, routine walk-arounds to identify potential machine issues. Once issues are discovered, the correct team must be notified immediately to ensure the problem is resolved promptly. Identifying and tagging the concerns is a helpful way to visualize and track the repair progress for your injection molding machines. Outside assistance from your ENGEL service support technicians compliments your existing preventative maintenance protocols and sheds some of the burden from your internal teams.

ENGEL is your service partner with a comprehensive portfolio of maintenance packages for your needs. Call us at (717) 714-3235 or contact us at [email protected], and we can work on maximizing your machine availability together.

For more information, visit engelglobal.com.

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