Corrective maintenance characteristics, types, examples

The Corrective maintenance It is a type of maintenance that is carried out to repair or change equipment that has failures or has stopped working properly. For a long time, approximately until the First World War, it was the only type of maintenance that was carried out, since only what was damaged was repaired.

Today companies adopt other types of maintenance (preventive or predictive, among others) for most of their machines or equipment, thus trying to guarantee a longer useful life and preventing unexpected failures of the same..

However, corrective maintenance is usually used in equipment that does not put a company's production line at risk, or in companies that do not have a budget to carry out preventive maintenance, among other cases..

In any case, even though other types of maintenance have been planned on the equipment, the appearance of unexpected failures generates that corrective maintenance has to be carried out on them for their repair and subsequent start-up..

Article index

• 1 Characteristics of corrective maintenance
• 2 Types of corrective maintenance
  • 2.1 Scheduled corrective maintenance
  • 2.2 Unscheduled corrective maintenance
• 3 Advantages
  • 3.1 Low cost in the short term
  • 3.2 Needs very little planning
  • 3.3 Simplicity in the process
  • 3.4 Most effective solution in certain cases
• 4 Disadvantages
  • 4.1 It is unpredictable
  • 4.2 Downtime
  • 4.3 Shorter service life
• 5 Examples of corrective maintenance
  • 5.1 Example 1
  • 5.2 Example 2
  • 5.3 Example 3
  • 5.4 Example 4
• 6 References

Corrective maintenance characteristics

Some of the most important characteristics of corrective maintenance are the following:

• It can include the replacement of some part or the change of the complete equipment.
• It is applied when a failure occurs or is detected in a device.
• Can be scheduled or unscheduled.
• It does not represent any cost to the company while the equipment is in operation, but an unexpected failure can represent very high costs, if the equipment is important in the production chain.

Types of corrective maintenance

There are two types of corrective maintenance, scheduled and unscheduled. Basically, the main difference between the two has to do with the time in which the fault or breakdown is repaired, after it is detected.

Scheduled corrective maintenance

Scheduled corrective maintenance is not performed immediately, but rather on a planned basis. It is generally used in machines or systems that are not very important in the production chain of a company. Therefore, they can remain out of service without this meaning a delay in production or in the delivery times pre-established by the same..

In this way, it is possible to repair breakdowns at times when the necessary personnel, materials and tools are available to carry out this task, without interfering with the company's schedules..

An example of this type of maintenance occurs when a “run to failure” strategy is used, where a machine is used until it fails, to be later repaired or replaced..

Unscheduled corrective maintenance

The unscheduled corrective maintenance, also called emergency, is the one that is carried out immediately. This generally occurs when there is an unexpected break or failure in equipment that is necessary for the proper functioning of a company. Therefore, its repair and start-up are carried out urgently..

This type of maintenance is usually unavoidable, since regardless of the type of strategy developed to prevent unexpected failures, sometimes the breakdown of a machine or equipment is unavoidable..

In any case, a good planning of maintenance strategies greatly reduces possible failures..

Advantage

Some of the advantages of corrective maintenance are as follows:

Low cost in the short term

This type of maintenance does not carry out any operation, nor does it consume any type of resources while the equipment is in operation. Therefore, it does not mean any cost to the company.

Needs very little planning

No type of planning is needed, since corrective maintenance is applied once a breakdown of a piece of equipment has been detected or when it stops working due to a failure.

Simplicity in the process

Corrective maintenance is very simple to understand since it is used when a problem arises.

Most effective solution in certain cases

Corrective maintenance is usually the best option in cases where the failure of an equipment or machine does not represent inconveniences for the production chain, or also when the cost of stopping and repairing it is lower than the cost of another type of maintenance..

Disadvantages

Here are some of the disadvantages of corrective maintenance:

It's unpredictable

Corrective maintenance does not perform any type of check on the equipment while it is in operating condition. That is why any failure that occurs in it is not detected until the moment it occurs..

Inactivity time

The time to repair an equipment can be very long, since it may happen that the materials or personnel necessary to repair said equipment are not available.

Shorter shelf life

By not performing any type of maintenance on the equipment until it fails, the useful life of the equipment is considerably reduced.

Examples of corrective maintenance

Here are some examples of corrective maintenance:

Example 1

Example of a scheduled corrective maintenance:

A company has 5 printers in operation, which are used occasionally. When one of these breaks down, the company schedules its repair for a certain date, where it has personnel available to repair it..

In this case, the repair is not carried out immediately because the failure of a printer does not affect the operation of the company.

Example 2

Unscheduled corrective maintenance:

An air compressor, which is performed preventive maintenance every 30 days, shows a fault 20 days after the last service. Because it is a very important machine for the company, the compressor is repaired immediately.

Example 3

Unscheduled corrective maintenance:

The forklift of a company, on which no type of preventive maintenance is carried out, breaks down, causing an interruption in the production chain of the same.

In this case, an immediate repair is carried out so that the company returns to its normal course of work..

Example 4

Scheduled corrective maintenance

In a repair of the electrical part of an air conditioner, the technician verifies that the filters of the same need to be replaced. Although the equipment works correctly without replacing the filters, the technician schedules a new maintenance task for them to be replaced..

References

1. Editors of MaintainX. (2020). What is Corrective Maintenance? Retrieved from getmaintainx.com
2. Fiix editors. (2020). Corrective maintenance. Retrieved from fiixsoftware.com
3. García Garrido, S. (2009). INDUSTRIAL MAINTENANCE: Corrective Maintenance. Retrieved from renovetec.com
4. Njith, S. (2018). What is Corrective maintenance? Retrieved from automationforum.in
5. National Service of Training in Indigenous Work. (2007). CORRECTIVE, PREVENTIVE AND PREDICTIVE MAINTENANCE. Retrieved from academia.edu