While it may seem as though the overall cost of oil is the price per gallon, barrel or container, there’s often more to it. Disposal costs and labor expenses often attribute massive additions to any price of oil. Take a gallon of oil costing $5 as an example, the actual cost of that oil to a business is that $5 in addition to the labor hours they have to pay out.

It becomes the responsibility of your organization to ensure that its cost effectiveness for each operation is kept to a minimum. This is typically accomplished through all machinery performing at optimal levels. Most machinery’s most important maintenance functions are proper lubrication and completing regular oil changes. As many organizations understand, however, finding the time to do this amidst operations is extremely difficult as it can halt processes that are necessary to an organization’s success.

Not only can it impact the success of a business, it can also result in additional costs needing to be covered. For example, unnecessary oil changes. Many businesses believe their machines’ problems can all be solved from an oil change. Unfortunately, this isn’t true.  Not only do these organizations have to then pay for the oil change, but they’ll also be responsible for the spend necessary to solve the problem.

Another example of an additional cost being incurred is due to damage done to a machine. Let’s consider that there’s some form of under-filling the sump or reservoir. This can go on to introduce contaminated or incorrect product. So not only will these instances result in machine damage, but they could also impact the goods that customers receive. This can spring about even more additional expenses for an organization.

As mentioned above, both damage and inadequate maintenance could ultimately lead to equipment failure. What contributes most to a machine’s failure, though? Majority of time, damages are a result of bearing malfunctions. Nearly 40-50% of machine failures are attributed to improper lubrication or re-lubrication of bearings. Even organizations willing to expend the capital for the right parts to resolve their issue can be met with their machine becoming non-operational. In that case, much more capital will have to be spent to keep the machine alive.

In order to avoid these catastrophic failures, organizations should both understand the risks and be more prepared for them. Whether it be preventive solutions such as re-engineering their machinery entirely or upgrading machinery with new cutting-edge technology to improve it; there are methods in place to avoid this failure and keep operations running smoothly. To learn more about how your business can be better prepared for unexpected downtime in addition to ways to reduce this downtime all together, spend some time checking out the infographic featured alongside this post. Courtesy of Isomag.