UPS/STANDBY POWER
Why UPS maintenance matters Chris Cutler of Riello UPS explains why regular maintenance is crucial to the long-term performance of your uninterruptible power supplies and outlines the benefits of giving a bit of TLC to your UPS. ninterruptible power supplies offer you that ultimate protection against unplanned downtime. Whether it’s in a mission-critical setting such as a data centre or hospital, or in a sports stadium, office or shop, they work away in the background to help keep your vital equipment and systems running. But once you’ve got your UPS protection in place, there’s no room for complacency and the worst thing you can do is think you’ve got everything sorted so you can forget about it. That unit is a sophisticated piece of kit in its own right. It’s probably cost anywhere from a few hundred pounds for the smallest system, through to tens or even hundreds of thousands of pounds for larger installations. To get the best out of such an investment, you need to look after it. Wear and tear over time is unavoidable. It goes without saying that if your UPS and batteries aren’t well maintained, you’re taking an unnecessary gamble that it won’t work correctly when you need it most, with all the disastrous consequences that a dropped load can bring. However, adopting a proactive approach to maintenance offers much more than simply reducing your risk of failure. It ensures your UPS runs more efficiently, which in turn reduces power consumption. It also maximises the lifespan of the system, which optimises your total cost of ownership (TCO).
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That’s why mission-critical sites such as data centres tend to opt for an ongoing maintenance plan. These agreements spell out the emergency response time for engineers to attend site in the event of something going wrong. They also include provision for at least one Preventive Maintenance Visit (PMV) a year. Even for UPSs that aren’t covered under a maintenance contract, regular service visits are highly recommended. It’s similar to getting an annual ‘health check’ for your car or boiler – it provides that peace of mind that everything’s working properly. Competence is critical We’ll get to the nitty-gritty of what a PMV should include shortly. But firstly, let’s tackle the thorny question of who is going to carry out the service visit. As touched on above, a UPS is a complex electrical device that needs handling with care. Your general maintenance or electrical engineer is unlikely to have the product-specific knowledge to carry out the task. Someone who isn’t familiar with a UPS can easily carry out service procedures in the wrong order or accidentally throw an incorrect switch – never forget that human error is the most common cause of downtime.
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