If you manage maintenance at an industrial facility, you know how much can go wrong when electrical and instrumentation (E&I) work isn’t done carefully. A small oversight can lead to downtime, safety hazards, or expensive rework. With Partner Industrial offering a full suite of maintenance services — including Electrical & Instrumentation among many others — it’s worth knowing what common mistakes occur and how to avoid them.

Here are frequent pitfalls — and concrete steps you (or your maintenance team) can take to avoid them.

Mistake #1: Treating All Equipment the Same

Often, maintenance teams apply the same schedule and checks to every piece of equipment — whether it’s a heavy‑duty motor, a control panel, or a sensor array. That “one-size-fits-all” mindset tends to waste resources on some assets and neglect critical care on others.

Avoid it by: categorizing equipment based on criticality, usage, and operating conditions. Prioritize inspections and maintenance for high‑impact or heavily‑used equipment; use lighter schedules for less critical systems. Adjust periodicity based on real usage data and failure history.

Mistake #2: Ignoring Wiring, Grounding, and Insulation Degradation

Wires age, insulation cracks, connectors loosen, and grounding deteriorates — especially in industrial environments with moisture, temperature swings, vibration, or chemicals. If you don’t inspect these regularly, you risk shorts, leak currents, or unpredictable failures.

Avoid it by: scheduling regular inspections of wiring insulation, grounding integrity, and connection tightness. Use thermal or infrared scanning when possible to detect hotspots. Check after any heavy use, vibration, or environmental stress — don’t wait until a failure occurs.

Mistake #3: Overlooking Power Quality and Supply Issues

Sometimes it’s not the device — it’s the power feeding it. Poor voltage stability, surges, harmonics or surges can stress drives, PLCs, sensitive instrumentation. Over time, that will erode their reliability or lead to unexpected shutdowns.

Avoid it by: monitoring power‑quality parameters (voltage, surges, harmonics) at critical supply points. If you detect repeated issues, consider installing surge protectors, voltage regulators, or power‑conditioning devices. Good grounding and shielding also help reduce electrical “noise” on instrumentation.

Mistake #4: Skipping Instrument Calibration or Loop Checks

Instrumentation — sensors, transmitters, meter loops — gradually drift or degrade. If you don’t calibrate or perform loop checks at regular intervals, you may end up with inaccurate readings. That leads to wrong control decisions, subpar quality, or even safety hazards.

Avoid it by: establishing a calibration schedule for all instrumentation, especially critical sensors. Log calibration dates, instrument IDs, results, and next due dates. Each time you replace or repair instrumentation, recalibrate. Treat calibration as part of your core maintenance, not as an optional add‑on.

Mistake #5: Relying Only on Reactive Maintenance (Fix When It Breaks)

Waiting until a breaker trips, a motor fails, or a control panel malfunctions can feel cost‑efficient in the short run — but reactive maintenance often brings unplanned downtime, safety risks, emergency procurement of parts, and rushed repairs.

Avoid it by: combining preventive maintenance with condition‑based checks. For example: periodic inspections, wiring and insulation checks, calibration, power‑quality monitoring. Adopt a structured maintenance schedule based on the age, usage, and criticality of equipment.

Mistake #6: Skipping Documentation and Maintenance Logs

When maintenance histories aren’t tracked, you lose visibility over past repairs, replacements, inspections. That makes troubleshooting harder and increases the risk of repeated errors or redundant work.

Avoid it by: keeping clear, consistent logs for every maintenance action: date, person doing the work, equipment identifier, what was done, findings, and next inspection date. A simple spreadsheet or basic database works — consistency is what matters.

Mistake #7: Using Low‑Quality Parts to Save Money

In trying to reduce immediate expenses, some facilities use inexpensive or off‑spec parts — cables, breakers, sensors, connectors. Over time, these can cause failures, poor performance, or unexpected breakdowns.

Avoid it by: investing in quality parts that meet the original or required specs, especially for critical circuits, instrumentation loops, and safety‑related systems. Think long‑term: a slightly more expensive breaker or sensor may save you far more in downtime and replacements.

Mistake #8: Not Adjusting Maintenance Strategy When Operations Change

Over time, your plant may change: more output, different processes, added lines, heavier loads. Yet sometimes maintenance schedules stay the same. This mismatch can lead to overloads, premature wear, or frequent issues.

Avoid it by: reviewing your maintenance and inspection schedules whenever you change operational load, add equipment, or modify processes. Re‑assess power supply, load distribution, wiring, protective devices — and adapt maintenance frequency accordingly.

Mistake #9: Underestimating the Value of a Multi‑Craft, Integrated Maintenance Approach

E&I systems never live alone: they connect with insulation, structural elements, coatings, safety systems, automation, and more. Treating electrical maintenance in isolation — without coordination with scaffolding, insulation, coatings, or other trades — leads to inefficiencies, rework, or even safety gaps.

Avoid it by: adopting an integrated maintenance plan. That’s exactly the kind of approach Partner Industrial provides — combining scaffolding, insulation, coatings, electrical & instrumentation, and more into a coordinated maintenance strategy.When planning maintenance, consider all related crafts together.

Mistake #10: Neglecting Long‑Term Maintenance Strategy and Data‑Driven Planning

If your facility only reacts to failures — without long-term planning, data collection, or performance tracking — you end up inefficient and unprepared. Over time costs rise, reliability drops, and risk increases.

Avoid it by: building a maintenance plan that includes scheduled inspections, calibrations, condition monitoring, periodic full‑system audits, and data logging. Use data from past failures or maintenance records to refine your approach. Transparency and planning help you stay ahead — not behind failures.

Conclusion — Why Careful E&I Maintenance Matters

Electrical and instrumentation maintenance isn’t just another check‑box task. It’s central to plant reliability, safety, and long-term operational efficiency. If you treat E&I maintenance seriously — with proper inspections, calibration, quality components, documentation, and integrated planning — you reduce downtime, avoid emergencies, and extend the life of your facility.

If you work with a full-service maintenance provider or manage maintenance internally, these guidelines stay relevant — they help you catch avoidable mistakes and ensure a safer, more stable operation.

Paying attention to the details now will save you time, money, and headaches down the road.