REPORT ON PLANT MAINTENANCE

Plant maintenance is the maintenance department of Fabrics unit of VTL, which presides over all the
maintenance work of Knitting, Dyeing, Finishing, washing and lab and operates and controls the entire
utility section. This report contains some observations and necessary recommendations on some
particular activities of Plant Maintenance.
Pre-maintenance
Observations
- The schedule for pre-maintenance becomes difficult to maintain sometimes because of the
noncooperation from production section and manpower limitation from our side
- Lack of awareness of personnel concerning existing preventive maintenance schedule
- Operators rely entirely on pre-maintenance team for maintenance works including basic dust
cleaning
- Lack of communication between personnel of adjacent shifts concerning what has been done
and what is left to do
- Frequent waiting time in between various maintenance work due to parts, tools & items stuck in
requisition process
- Some machines need to be stopped and cooled down before maintenance work can be done on
them, but too much production workload prevents those work to be done in due time

Recommendations
- It is very important that the operators are informed that pre-maintenance team is not for
regular cleaning work, they are for cleaning and maintaining critical components of the machine
which are not accessible to the operators. Thus regular cleaning work is to be performed by the
operators either at the end of each shift or at the end of each batch.
- Operators should be provided with 15 minutes time at the end of each shift or each batch for
clean up and shift supervisor or senior operator will personally make visual inspections for
cleanups.
- Pre-maintenance team will inform the production unit at least two days before scheduled pre-
maintenance and will request the tentative time of machine hand over. Maintenance team will
be there on given time to start pre-maintenance.
- Due to limitation of manpower it becomes difficult for pre-maintenance team to complete all
tasks in time, thus machine operators should always be by their side to assist them when
required.
- Maintenance team should also be sincere about their responsibilities and inform any difficulty
to seniors when needed.
- During pre-maintenance, if any major flaw is noticed, repair work should be initiated instantly; if
not possible then it will be scheduled for next possible date after discussing it with production
unit.
- A check list should be maintained for each machine to ensure cleaning and inspection of all
required parts without fail. It will also ensure proper documentation of work.
Waste Control
Waste is a part of work and it is nearly impossible to eliminate it completely, but it certainly is possible
to minimize it to a tolerable level. Waste may be big or small but it is to be remembered that waste is
waste and it is to be reduced.
Observations
- Wastes are observed most in small cases like use of cable ties, WD40, air pipe, cables, fuses,
tape etc.
- A major source of waste is poor quality of purchased equipments, which causes frequent
replacement of same part and thus results into biggest waste.
- Recurrence of same error is also a kind of waste and it wastes both time and resources and
causes loss in production.
- One of the major reasons behind recurrence of errors is the quick solution push that comes
from production. These quick solutions sometimes escalate the overall repair cost.
- Negligence may also be considered as a waste in some particular cases, because negligence in
repairing a machine today might cause permanent damage to it tomorrow.
Recommendations
- When it comes to waste control, alertness of the maintenance stuff is most essential as they are
the ones producing the waste. If they are provided with a list of items and instructed that you
have to reduce waste in their use than it will certainly produce a positive result.
- In order to ensure quality of purchased product, a quality card may be maintained which will
include signs of the Purchase Officer, Keeper of Store and Manager- Plant Maintenance to
ensure required quality of product.
- In some cases, direct purchase from market can ensure better quality and price than purchase
through tender. Thus purchase should be given a certain amount of flexibility in case of
purchase below a certain amount.
- Recurring of errors may be minimized significantly by going for permanent solutions rather than
making temporary fixes.
We must understand that waste is a part of work and we cannot hamper regular activity in the
process of waste control.

Communication Gap
Defined chain of command and communication is essential for every department so that it may run
efficiently and smoothly.
Observations
- Regarding the transmission of information and the seeking of permission up the hierarchy of the
department, there seems to be a lack of clearly defined chain or priority protocol. This creates a
communication gap and causes disharmony within the staff.
- Sometimes there are arguments and discord between personnel over unshared information,
mostly due to the negligence of the informer.
- In some cases, there is a breach of chain in informing and permission seeking, where personnel
in between the upper and lower tiers are left in the dark.
Recommendations
- A protocol should be laid down, clearly defining the pathway of the chain to be followed
regarding information sharing and permission seeking, according to various situations resulting
in various priorities.
- The process of exchange of information should be brought to completion with the information
finally reaching the end of the chain, i.e. the highest relevant hierarchy. This will ensure that no
one is left out in the awareness of ongoing events.
- The informant must follow the chronological order of immediate superiors to be informed,
while passing information or seeking permission, instead of breaking the chain and ignoring his
immediate superiors.


This report attempts to provide a few of our observations in the relevant contexts and their subsequent
recommendations to improve the overall functioning of plant maintenance department.