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Protect your Power Infrastructure from unexpected downtime The unsung heroes of infrastructure are Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) systems that silently sit in data centers, hospitals, and industrial facilities waiting to do what they do best whenever utility power goes offline. But the only sure way to guarantee that your UPS systems perform well is through scheduled and preventive maintenance, which you can make much more effective through predictive maintenance and data analytics.
How Predictive Maintenance Identifies Potential UPS Failures
The common maintenance methods were proactive, or scheduled maintenance or time based maintenance, and reactive or emergency maintenance. Reactive maintenance did not repair equipment until after it failed-a hazardous plan in the case of critical emergency equipment backup power units. In time based maintenance equipment and spare parts were scheduled for replacement on an exact schedule and on a time basis without respect to actual wear and tear-resulting in too much replacement and too little maintenance.
Predictive maintenance alters that equation with real-time information that helps to anticipate equipment failures. Today’s UPS systems are equipped with sensors that monitor everything from operating temperature to voltage, current, and even battery health. Sophisticated software and complex algorithms can be trained to spot trends, such as the subtle changes that will signal an impending equipment failure-the slowly increasing equivalent series resistance (ESR) of a capacitor, the decreasing capacity of a battery cell, or the worsening vibration of a cooling fan.
Having this early-warning capability gives facility managers the option of planning the work to be completed in their planned maintenance intervals instead of having to react to a real failure. In the case of mission-critical facilities, the impact of downtime can cost the business as much as several million dollars per hour, so predicting failures becomes a requirement, not a benefit.
Extending Battery Life Through Continuous Monitoring
Batteries are the weakest link in any UPS. Battery capacity gradually degrades as it gets exposed to changes in the environment (such as temperature), and as it cycles on and off to charge and discharge and just age. Battery degradation is often silent and unbeknown to until it fails during a power outage, which is exactly the time it's meant to kick in.
Predictive maintenance can eliminate that security breach via ongoing battery monitoring. New UPS systems allow managers to remotely monitor individual cells within their batteries to assess such conditions as the internal resistance of cells, whether battery voltages are balanced and operating temperatures to gauge the actual condition of the batteries and alert them before batteries fail.
This solution extends the lifespan of batteries and lowers the frequency of battery replacement. Organizations can avoid the expense of replacing all the batteries in a battery bank at the same time on a pre-determined schedule. Only failing batteries need replacement, decreasing the environmental impact. Less waste means a smaller toll on natural resources and landfills.
Reducing Maintenance Costs and Unplanned Downtime
The savings provided by predictive maintenance are more than just replacing batteries. It replaces traditional service that requires routine service visits whether a battery or component needs service or not, resulting in unnecessary labor and material expense. Predictive maintenance can be used as a catalyst to condition based service, where work is performed only as indicated by analysis.
There’s a huge cost attached. When a data center goes down it’s expensive-more than $9,000 a minute with an average outage clocking in around $700,000. That number doesn’t include the value of lost customers, which could potentially be even higher. For a data center having one unplanned outage per year, even one outage could bring lost business to quite a few.
Predictive maintenance can also enhance the productivity of your workforce. By arriving at a job site with the necessary tools and parts to fix an equipment malfunction, your technicians can resolve problems more rapidly. With remote monitoring solutions, technicians in any location can assist the equipment technicians on the ground to diagnose issues without the need for them to fly across the country to the facility.
Modern UPS Manufacturers Provide Superior Monitoring Capabilities Modern UPS manufacturers such as Weitu Hongda provide intelligent battery management features to help businesses gain visibility into the overall health of the battery and get early notification before any equipment failure can be noticed, as the UPS and monitoring features integrate seamlessly with building management platforms to deliver real-time visibility for your whole facilities network.
Building a Predictive Maintenance Strategy
There are two critical components to successfully implementing a UPS-based predictive maintenance program, technology and culture. It all starts with a system approach to UPS-based predictive maintenance, that is to install UPS systems that are rich with sensors, communications and software that generate meaningful data.
Many companies provide integration with building or facility management software, helping their clients manage, monitor, and react to alerts in their existing environment. Additionally, various UPS vendors provide a Cloud-based solution which gives access to highly trained engineers who can review, analyze, and advise on critical system information.
Raw data is useless until a meaningful action is taken based on it. Maintenance teams require easy-to-follow procedures when responding to monitoring alerts and when they encounter the following information from monitors: The specified life of the battery has been reached, The specified capacity service date has been met, The required life of the fan has been reached; Monitoring data must also be regularly examined, and these life-spans adjusted based on real world usage data
Shenzhen Weitu Hongda Industrial Co., Ltd. we know that the quality of UPS is something that you cannot doubt at any given moment. Just like our pledge for intelligent manufacturing services, we stand beside our clients to safeguard their businesses and help them plan maintenance on their UPSs so that you won’t have to wait for the unexpected. What you install today, your future success is built upon.