By taking a proactive approach to maintenance, you can avoid reacting to emergencies, schedule your downtime, and add to your bottom line.

by Christina Fisher

A thorough drill rig inspection can cost around $500, but can prevent unanticipated downtime that can result in the loss of thousands of dollars worth of production. Here, Jim Perry, drill specialist with Linder Machinery Co., inspects a drill engine.

A drill makes money when it is operating efficiently and maintaining productivity levels. It has to be ready when the operator climbs into the cab and powers up the machine. By implementing and adhering to a routine maintenance schedule and taking advantage of an equipment auditing program, unscheduled downtime can be avoided — and you can add to your productivity and bottom line.

The operator and the daily checklist are the first line of defense against equipment failure. All drill manufacturers include daily checklists in their service manuals. Many aggregate producers tailor these checklists to meet their specific needs. Drill manufacturers also have recommended service schedules that should be followed.

Atlas Copco’s ROC Care program, for example, offers scheduled routine services, a detailed rig inspection, and an extended warranty program. Satellite monitoring is also available on some models. “The … program can be structured to meet the needs of the customer,” says Andrew Lee, district manager for Atlas Copco Construction Mining Technique USA. “Customers that take advantage of the program see a major return on their investment.”

Linder Industrial Machinery Co., an equipment dealer in the Carolinas and Florida, has incorporated the preventive maintenance program into its own drill auditing process. Linder services all drill makes and models, so it has developed a generic inspection/auditing form that can be used to cover all of the critical areas on any drill. The entire drill rig is inspected during the course of the audit. If a minor repair is needed, the drill technician can take care of it right away or provide a quote. If the repair is more extensive, the technician can point it out and schedule a maintenance visit for a later date if the customer chooses.

John Coughlin, Linder’s vice president of service, explains that although Linder has always provided service support for drills, “We found it very effective to go out and perform periodic inspections of the drills rather than just reacting to people who call with failures or a problem. This limits or reduces the downtime.” 

The number of audits performed depends on the customer’s needs and requirements. “We like to do it quarterly,” Coughlin says, “but most of the companies are now doing it once every six months because activity has dropped. Companies who do it more often benefit more from it.”

Linder charges $500, not including the cost of parts, for each audit. “The cost of the inspection is very small in comparison to the length of time it takes to perform the inspection,” Coughlin says. “Depending on the size of the drill, an inspection can take between six and 16 hours. It’s a pretty intense inspection with detailed results given back to the operator or end user.”

Nevertheless, Lee adds that many aggregate producers raise concerns about the cost of an equipment auditing program, particularly in the current economy. A quick look at the numbers, though, may overcome financial concerns and demonstrate that any thorough routine maintenance program can actually add to the bottom line.

“It’s easy math,” Lee explains. “Take a million-ton-a-year operation. Divide the million tons by 12, which is approximately 84,000 tons a month that a quarry manager must produce. Divide this by 25 working days a month; now you’re producing 3,360 tons a day. Divide by eight hours in a day, and you get 420 tons an hour. Multiply this by $15, which is an average selling price for a ton of aggregate. This means the average quarry is producing $6,300 an hour or $50,400 a day worth of aggregate.

“With these numbers in hand, you can show the quarry manager that an auditing program is well worth the investment,” Lee says. “If the auditing program keeps him up and operational for only one hour, then the investment has made him money. Look at how much he’s losing if the drill is down.”