What is the essential outcome of Preventative Maintenance?

• A. Increases downtime
• B. Prevents breakdowns
• C. Diminishes reliability
• D. Increases repair costs

Answer: (B)

Preventative maintenance is about catching wear and potential faults before they cause a failure, keeping equipment operating as designed. The essential outcome is to prevent breakdowns by addressing lubrication, adjustments, replacements, and inspections on a schedule. When parts are serviced or replaced before they fail, unexpected outages are avoided, uptime improves, and safety is enhanced. This approach also tends to lower overall costs because fixing issues early is typically cheaper and less disruptive than emergency repairs after a breakdown. Planned downtime for maintenance may occur, but it is outweighed by the reduction in unplanned downtime and repair expenses.