When he retired, I knew I didn't have that skill set, and I didn't have the time to do the maintenance myself. I had to find a way to ensure there was a system in place to do the things my dad had done for 25 years.
That's what led me to create a maintenance schedule and calendar. My thinking was this: By doing the best we could to regularly maintain our equipment and facility, we would minimize the cost and disruption that results from things breaking down or needing to be replaced prematurely. And by scheduling that maintenance throughout the year, we would minimize the interruption that maintenance causes to production, and improve cashflow by spreading the expense of maintenance more evenly throughout the year.
So I started with a walkthrough of the shop, making a list of all the equipment that we had (a side benefit is this ensures your accountant has an accurate list of assets for depreciation), and all the items in the building that could benefit from regular maintenance. I suggest you do this walkthrough after work or on a weekend when you're less apt to get interrupted or distracted and miss some items.
You can download my list by looking for "maintenance calendar" in the "Forms & Tools" section of my website (www.collisionadvice.com), but the equipment includes not just the obvious paint booth and frame rack, but also the thinner recycler, vehicle lifts, wheel balancer and office equipment. It also includes maintenance on such things as the garage door openers, fire extinguishers, sprinkler heads, and the building's heating and air conditioning systems. The state my business was located in required biennial inspections of air compressor tanks. Our list also included regular calibration of such things as the paint scale and alignment equipment.
Next, I checked with vendors and service providers for all of these items to find out what they recommended in terms of regular maintenance. When practical, I got estimates from them for this work to help me with budgeting and scheduling.
I then sat down with my employees and determined what maintenance items we could handle in-house, and which would best be handled by an outside vendor. The list could then be broken down by what needed to be done weekly, monthly, quarterly, annually or every other year. The employee or outside company (with phone number) who would handle each task also was listed.
Next, I used a calendar program to layout a schedule for all the items on the list. I tried to avoid having more than any one of the major maintenance expenses in any month, and considered how best to avoid production disruptions. It made no sense, for example, to have both booths in one of my shops serviced in the same month.
That calendar is part of what we used during our daily production meetings, so it would prompt us to remind the person responsible for inspecting the fire extinguishers, for example, to do that during the week it was scheduled.
Another benefit of such a program: It can help you "sustain" – the fifth "S" of the five S's involved in "lean." Regular inspections of the parts room or paint mixing room can be among the scheduled items, for example, to ensure they are being maintained after they have been sorted, set, shined and standardized.
One last point: Maintenance of employees is just as important as maintenance of equipment and facility. I'll address that topic in a future column.
Mike Anderson is a former shop owner who operates CollisionAdvice.com, a training and consulting firm. He is also a facilitator for DuPont Performance Services' Business Council 20-groups. E-mail a question you'd like to have Mike address to [email protected].
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