Seven tips for UPS maintenance

Your uninterruptible power supply (UPS) system is the data center's first line of defense against power fluctuations (spikes, drops, etc.). Because thousands of dollars (or more) of IT equipment depends on a clean power supply

Your uninterruptible power supply (UPS) system is the data center's first line of defense against power fluctuations (spikes, drops, etc.). Because tens of thousands of dollars (or more) of IT equipment depends on a clean power supply, you may not be able to afford to take action after the problem occurs. Before your UPS system takes action, preventive maintenance is essential to ensure normal operation time and protect sensitive electronic equipment.

About two-thirds of downtime events are preventable, and insufficient maintenance is one of the main reasons for downtime events. You may not be able to do much to deal with malicious attacks, some failures of service providers and unforeseen equipment failures, but you can take measures to ensure that many potential downtime events are avoided. The scope of preventive maintenance spans the entire data center system, and each system has its own requirements. In the case of UPS systems, here are a few tips (in no particular order) to help ensure that power fluctuations do not threaten your IT equipment.

Preventive UPS maintenance skills

1、 Put safety first. Life and physical safety are above all else. When you're dealing with electricity, a small mistake can cause serious injury or death. Therefore, when dealing with systems related to UPS (or any electronic system in the data center), ensuring safety is a top priority, including following the manufacturer's recommendations and focusing on facility specific implementation rules and standard safety guidelines. If you do not know how to maintain or repair your UPS system or some aspects, please ask professionals. Even if you know the internal and external conditions of your UPS system, getting external assistance is still a guarantee.

2、 Maintain it regularly and stick to it. Preventive maintenance should be performed on a regular basis, especially considering the potential cost of downtime. For your ups and other systems in the data center, you should arrange regular maintenance activities (annual, semi annual or any time frame) and stick to the schedule. This includes maintaining a written (paper or electronic) record list of upcoming maintenance activities, as well as whether and when repairs have been performed in the past.

3、 Keep detailed records. In addition to regular maintenance, you should also keep a record of what is being maintained (for example, cleaning, repairing, or replacing certain components), as well as the condition of the equipment during inspection. Cost tracking is also useful when you need to show a few yuan repair cost per time to avoid thousands or millions of downtime costs. A task list, such as checking for battery corrosion, excessive torque of connecting wires, etc., helps to maintain an orderly approach. All documentation can help you plan when to replace equipment or UPS for unscheduled maintenance and troubleshooting. In addition to keeping records, make sure they are always in a location known to staff and accessible to them.

4、 Perform regular inspections. In the above methods, there are many that can be applied to almost any part of the data center. It is a good practice to perform safe and regular maintenance and keep good records, no matter what kind of situation the data center is in. However, UPS is quite special. Some tasks can and should be carried out regularly by the staff (should be familiar with, at least understand the basic operation of UPS). UPS maintenance tasks include the following important contents:

1. Visually inspect the ups and battery (or other energy storage) equipment for obstructions and properly cool the surrounding area.

2. Make sure there is no abnormal operation or warning on the ups panel, such as overload or battery near over discharge.

3. Check for signs of battery corrosion or other defects.

4. Consult the manufacturer's equipment guidelines and recommendations. You should perform maintenance (or hire a professional to do so), as recommended by the manufacturer, often or at least in some cases, of course, the more often you check, the better.

5. Recognize that UPS components will fail. It seems obvious that any failure probability will eventually result in failure. Key UPS components, such as batteries and capacitors, will wear away in normal use, so even if your utility provides perfect power, your ups room is completely clean, and everything is running under ideal conditions at a proper and stable temperature, and the components will still fail. Your UPS system still needs to be maintained.

6. Know who to call when you need service or unscheduled maintenance. During daily or weekly inspections, problems may occur and it may not be possible to wait for the next scheduled maintenance. In this case, knowing who to call can greatly reduce the pressure. That is, you have to identify solid service providers who can provide services when you need them. If you keep a good maintenance record in the same place where you install UPS, you will be able to provide useful information when the supplier arrives, which may save a lot of service time and fees.

7. Assign tasks. "Shouldn't you have checked last week?" "No