Importance of Preventive Maintenance for Industrial Generators

Industrial generators are the backbone of your facility in the event of an outage. Ensuring your facility has industrial generators is important, and preventing them from potential failure with preventive maintenance is even more imperative to your facility. Power outages are common, especially in California due to extreme weather conditions and other impactful elements.

Learn more about the importance of preventive maintenance for industrial generators, power outage risks for industrial facilities and what to do if your generator fails in a time of need.

Why are Industrial Generators Valuable to Have?

Power outages are becoming more of a frequent occurrence, with the Southwest experiencing a 113% increase in weather-related outages in the last decade compared to the decade prior. For California, this means an increase in wildfires, heat waves and other extreme weather conditions contributing to outages across the state, leaving hundreds of thousands of people and companies without power for long periods of time.

On top of that, Californians have been victim to rolling blackouts recently — the first in roughly 20 years — from this increase of extreme heat in the state. Extreme weather in California is inevitable and only becoming more frequent. You can’t prevent the weather, but you can prevent your facility from being affected by these outages with the use of industrial generators.

Weather is not the only factor contributing to power outages. Events like vehicles striking power lines, operational mismanagement leading to faulty connections, or trees falling on power lines can cause an outage that will impact your facility if you are not prepared properly. No matter the cause of the outage, industrial generators are essential for your facility so these mishaps do not interrupt your operations for indefinite amounts of time.

Industrial generators provide immense value to your manufacturing, agriculture or other industrial facility by providing an immediate supply of backup power to your building. This power enables your workers to continue with their jobs, meaning production will not slow down and deadlines can still be met. Without industrial generators, your operations can take a huge hit after an outage, and revenue hits will follow.

Many industrial facilities are not prepared for outages with backup generators. When extreme weather hits, their facilities shut down and operations come to a halt. However, you can prepare your commercial facility with sufficient industrial backup power before the outages happen so your operations will never suffer for indefinite periods of time.

Risks of Generator Failure During an Outage 

Your facility may experience several risks if your generator fails during an outage. You risk a loss of productivity by having all your workers present and the inability to proceed with work. Important data can be lost from computers and software that may have contained large spreadsheets or valuable information.

Extreme heat during an outage can damage costly equipment you did not plan to replace for several more years. These are just a few examples, but a loss of power can affect your facility in endless ways without a sufficient backup plan.

Countless industries are susceptible to generator failures during a power outage. These outages are costly. In fact, a study showed that power outages cost over $27 billion to businesses each year. Your facility is not completely protected from outages simply by having industrial generators. Power outage risks are still plausible if preventive measures are not taken ahead of time.

Each industry may suffer from generator failure in different ways, and here are a few:

Manufacturing

Assembly lines with conveyor belts cannot continue to run in an outage, and no products can be worked on. Heavy machinery relies on stable power connections to work and run. In addition to the operations inside the facility being affected, your clients expecting their products are also affected.

Another company may be relying on a shipment from a manufacturing facility, but with the failed generator, your business-to-business partner may have vulnerable deadlines that affect their clients and line of operations, as well. Customers that ordered directly from the facility will not get their products on time, affecting your reputation and their daily lives. All these power outage risks can take a toll on a manufacturing facility’s revenue stream.

Pharmaceutical or Agricultural Settings

Though very different, both of these industries rely on goods that must be kept at specific temperatures and climates. Without power, these industries risk losing thousands of dollars in revenue from ruined products. Medicines, vaccines and other pharmaceutical products cannot take a fluctuation in temperature control and must be discarded if this occurs.

Fresh or frozen food, crops and produce all can be ruined from insufficient refrigeration and will also have to be discarded. Industrial refrigeration systems that store these goods heavily rely on sufficient power and cannot risk a generator failure. Perishable items are greatly affected by power outages due to the necessary temperature and preservation measures they require.

Hospitals and Care Facilities

These facilities rely on power around the clock to care for their patients. Generators can supply power to these facilities to ensure all their medical equipment like:

• Heart monitors
• Oxygen supplement machines
• Dialysis equipment
• And many other essential pieces of equipment continue to function regardless of power outages

The risks of generator failure during power outages not only affect products, but lives, too. Hospitals and care facilities can hold hundreds of people at a time. A sudden generator failure during a power outage can cost many lives, something that these facilities cannot afford.

Why Generator Preventive Maintenance Is Important

Generator preventive maintenance is important because it eliminates risk for generator failure during a power outage. Preventive maintenance ensures your machinery and equipment are working properly and efficiently and can even extend their life spans. Preventive maintenance can also keep your operations running smoothly by ensuring your equipment is working properly before you even need it.

To name a few ways how generator preventive maintenance can reduce risk, it can:

• Identify potential issues before they occur: Wear and tear happen on all sorts of equipment, even your generators. With preventive care for generators, you can find errors or faulty equipment before you need to rely on it during an outage. Potential problems could be that your generators are not strong enough to supply the amount of energy needed to your facility because they are incorrect sizes and take on too much load. They may need new oil or new fuel filters to run properly. Your wires may need to be tightened or replaced if they have become corroded. Preventive maintenance ensures the fuel supply is sufficient so the generator has fuel to burn when it needs it. Neglecting these potential issues may result in a failure.
• Improve the generator’s performance: Properly maintaining your generator improves its overall performance. Ensuring there is a sufficient supply of lubricant, fuel and oil in the generator helps it perform optimally. This ensures all parts are working properly and smoothly with minimal wear and tear because the generator has all necessary components. Without preventive maintenance, you risk damaging your generator because it has to run without being properly maintained.
• Increase the life span of the generator: With minimal wear and tear from preventive maintenance comes an increase in the life span of your generator. Taking precautionary steps to ensure your generator has all the necessary equipment and supplies and that it runs properly expands its life since it can run as efficiently as possible. When your generator runs efficiently, you will not have to replace it as frequently.

The importance of preventive maintenance for generators comes with many advantages, too. Ensuring your generators work properly in the event of an outage assures you will have minimal interruptions with the workflow in your facility. Your generators will kick on seamlessly and keep running to supply power until the power comes back on. It improves efficiency in your facility since the equipment that relies on power does not have any downtime to stop working from an insufficient power supply.

Deadlines do not have to be missed when your facility is still running efficiently in a power outage. It saves your company money and allows for your orders to still be fulfilled without skipping a beat. Your revenue also will not be impacted by an outage.

What Steps are Taken During Generator Preventive Maintenance?

There are several steps taken during preventive maintenance for generators, especially given the various elements and components of industrial generators. Field technicians will follow these procedures to ensure your generators are working properly and will continue to run during an outage. Some common processes followed for preventive maintenance include:

1. Conducting Regular Inspections

Regular and recurrent inspections take place to ensure all components in your generator are working properly — especially when the generator’s expected life span is approaching. Inspections may include:

• Component inspection: If we know the oil needs to be changed every 100 hours of use, we will inspect and verify the oil levels before the time approaches. Field technicians will also ensure all the wires are in optimal condition without any fraying or evidence of corrosion. Inspecting these wires ensures your generator will not fail due to worn elements. Other component inspection elements include inspecting air and oil filters to see if they need to be replaced soon and ensuring the engine is working properly with all of its moving parts.
• System inspection: On the other hand, field technicians will also inspect the systems within the generator. Rather than individual component inspections, the technician inspects all of the systems to ensure all elements and moving parts are working together properly for the generator.

2. Following Part Replacement Schedules

In tandem with regular inspections, field technicians ensure all parts in your generator are up to date and are replaced when necessary according to their schedules of expected wear and tear. All of the parts in a generator have different life spans that wear out at different rates, so the field technician will ensure all parts are replaced at the proper times before they wear out and cause any damage to your generator. Allowing old parts to continue to operate can deteriorate the equipment and ruin the integrity of the overall generator, resulting in a system failure.

All of these processes are done to ensure your industrial generators are working as optimally and efficiently as possible. Regular preventive maintenance ensures all the parts in your generator are efficient and will not cause a failure when you need the equipment most. Taking these precautionary steps ensures your industrial generator will keep your operations running in a time of need.

What if Your Generator Fails During a Power Outage?

Having a backup industrial generator in the event of an emergency is essential to maintain your operations without sacrificing revenue or products. What happens if your generator does fail during a power outage? In this instance, it is imperative that you contact a trained professional to come to the scene and get your backup generator up and running again. Reliable emergency services are available to fix these problems immediately so your facility will not suffer from the outage and failed generator for longer than necessary.

If you experience a generator failure, you can trust Industrial Electrical Company for quick and reliable service. At Industrial Electrical Company, we have trained technicians that can come to you 24/7 for emergency generator repair services. We understand that having power in your facility is crucial and time-sensitive. Give us a call and we will have a technician heading your way immediately.