Maintenance Guidelines
Switchgear fails slowly and then suddenly. Loose terminations heat, insulation tracks and contacts erode over months, and the failure that follows looks instantaneous. A kept schedule is what turns that into a planned replacement. Confirm the intervals below against your service agreement, which takes precedence.
Monthly
- Visual inspection of panel exteriors: damage, corrosion, missing labels, door seals.
- Check indicator lamps, alarm annunciators and any local display.
- Confirm ventilation openings and filters are clear.
- Record any unexpected alarm since the last check, even one that cleared on its own.
Quarterly
- Thermographic survey under load. This is the single highest value check, because it finds loose joints before they fail.
- Clean panel interiors with dry compressed air, with the section isolated.
- Check and record UPS and tripping battery condition.
- Verify control supply voltages against nameplate.
Annually
- Torque check every accessible power termination to the specified figure.
- Insulation resistance tests, recorded and compared against the previous result. The trend matters more than the single value.
- Full functional test of protection, interlocks and emergency stops.
- Operate withdrawable units through their full travel and inspect contacts.
- Calibrate or verify sensors and transmitters.
Recording
Log every activity against the panel and project reference, including the measured values rather than a pass mark. A resistance figure recorded each year shows a developing fault; a tick box does not, and it will not support a warranty claim either.